Assembled We Are Strong
Chapter 21
AN: In this chapter Bruce gets an unexpected visitor, Tony gets some help, Natasha gets back to the Tower, Thor gets pizza and Steve gets to question an unconscious Clint.
AN2: Longer chapter this time, so a slightly longer time between posts. And in case it needs to be said again, your reviews and follows mean the world to me.
Bruce and Thor arrived back at the Tower many hours later. It had been dark before the Hulk had reached the shore and then it had taken a while for the enraged Hulk to realise that Cupid was being taken care of. After that it had only been a few minutes before Bruce had returned, shivering and wet. He'd been extremely glad that Thor was waiting with towels and clothes. Then it had just been a matter of boarding the Quinjet and heading back to the Tower. Thor filled him in on what he could and he dozed a little on the Quinjet, too tired not to, despite everything that had happened.
He wished that he wasn't returning to find Clint in the Infirmary. He couldn't help but feel that he'd failed him. Clint had asked for help and he hadn't been able to do much for him. He could only hope that the scanner that he and Tony had been working on held some hope for the archer.
When he entered the Infirmary he was rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He saw Doctor Sondheim standing waiting for him and knew that things were worse than he'd been led to believe this far. Erica would probably have gone home by now otherwise.
"Doctor Banner," she said in greeting. "It's good to see you back."
"I wish I could have got back sooner," he replied. "How's Clint?"
Erica's face gave away the news before she could speak. "Tony and I took the decision to put him into a medically induced coma."
Bruce nodded. It was a defeated nod of acknowledgement rather than acceptance. He'd half expected this, but it was still hard to hear.
"Meningitis?" he asked. It was her turn to nod.
"I assume you'd like to check on him," she said.
"Yes, I'd like to go over the treatment he's received," he said, but to be honest the need to see "Cupid" was also at the back of his mind. The Hulk was feeling protective, and Bruce hadn't felt that from him since he'd caught Tony in New York. He doubted that seeing Clint in intensive care was going to make either him or the Other Guy feel any better, but at least Clint was being looked after now. Bruce had no idea why Hulk had decided to call Clint "Cupid" (other than the obvious archery reference) but he supposed it was better than some other things that he could have come out with. He nearly hadn't believed Thor when he'd informed him of Hulk's nickname for the archer, but it was the wrong pantheon for Thor to be aware of what it meant.
Erica took him into Clint's room and he got to see him for the first time with his own eyes. The archer was pale and hooked up to a host of monitoring devices. Bruce wasn't sure if it would have been more scary if he didn't know what each one was for and why it was needed, but this was bad enough. Instead he was acquainted with all the reasons why Hawkeye needed his heart monitoring, and his blood pressure, and all the other things that were being logged. Jarvis was collating all the data and would let them know the moment something seemed off, hopefully before any of the alarms even sounded.
The ventilator was the worst part of it. It huffed breath into Clint's body and then withdrew it. It was entirely necessary and yet Bruce still hated its presence. Only patients who were incapable of breathing on their own needed ventilators, and that indicated a level of illness that Bruce didn't want to contemplate because it returned him to his own failure to help Clint. The Hulk grumbled in the back of his mind, but Bruce quieted him by pointing out that this was helping Clint to get better. It was giving his brain a chance to repair some of the damage and rest.
Erica took him through the treatment that Clint was receiving and Bruce agreed with it all. Doctor Henderson was efficient and had paid attention to every single note that had been added to Clint's medical records over the years, including which drugs to avoid and his recent light sensitivity. The lights were turned down low and Lady Gaga was playing quietly. Bruce approved, the music should help Clint to focus on the memories that he'd created with him and Erica. Doctors were still unsure what an unconscious person could experience whilst in a coma, so although he doubted that the memories would cause Clint more pain, the music wouldn't do any harm.
"I appreciate what you've done, Erica," said Bruce.
"I haven't done much of anything," said Erica. "Tony's the man with the plan. Hopefully he'll give us the information that we need to help Clint." She frowned. "I don't usually refer to my patients by their first names. I think it must be Tony's bad influence."
Bruce gave her a small smile. "Has anyone been here to talk to him? I'm firmly of the opinion that talking to coma patients is therapeutic."
Erica shook her head. "Tony and Captain Rogers seemed to take the medical coma decision quite hard. I'm not terribly surprised. I'll give it until tomorrow before I start rounding up volunteers to read to him."
Bruce nodded. He also wasn't at all surprised to hear that Tony and Steve required some time to process what had happened. He did too. However, right now, he was probably needed in Tony's lab.
"I'll talk to them, and put me on the list too," said Bruce and then moved closer to Clint. He squeezed the archer's hand gently. "Hang in there, Clint. I've got to go and work on the scanner with Tony right now, but I'll be back tomorrow to talk to you."
Bruce left Erica to her work and went down to the lab. There he found Thor, Steve and Tony, with about a dozen empty boxes of pizza and Thor finishing off the last half of a peperoni stuffed crust. Tony was working on part of the scanner, whilst Steve held up part of the cowling. It would have normally required one of Tony's robots to help them, but Steve didn't seem to be having any trouble with it.
Suddenly Bruce's stomach growled.
"Good evening, Doctor Banner," said Tony, directing a quick glance towards Bruce before he turned back to his work. "I hope you left some pizza for Bruce, Thor. You can put it down now, Steve."
Thor offered Bruce the last slice of pizza, which he gratefully accepted. Steve put down the machine cowling gently, making sure that Tony was well clear before he did so.
"Yes, sir," replied Jarvis, in reference to the pizza.
"I saw Clint," said Bruce, deciding to just get the difficult stuff out of the way.
"Yeah, so did we," said Steve, with a look towards Tony. "Doctor Sondheim seems to think that this will help." Steve indicated the machine that Tony was working on.
"It should," said Bruce. "Look, guys, one of the other things that might help would be if he had people to talk to him while he's unconscious."
Thor frowned. "Surely Hawkeye is sleeping and cannot hear us?"
"Doctors think that patients who are unconscious may still be aware of the world around them. Talking to him might help keep him anchored to the good memories that he's created here," said Bruce.
"Bruce is right," said Tony, not looking up from whatever he was now doing to the machine. "I read something about it."
"If the Doctors think it will help then count me in," said Steve.
"I too will make myself available," said Thor.
"Yeah, I would," said Tony, "but I think Clint would rather I worked on the machine that might actually save his life."
"Even you need a break, Tony," said Steve.
"Yes, to drink more coffee so that I can keep working," replied Tony.
Bruce rolled his eyes. "Tony, that isn't what Steve meant."
Tony abruptly stopped what he was doing and kicked back so that the wheeled stool that he was sat on scooted backwards. There was a touch of anger in his eyes. "Yeah, well you weren't the one who had to tell the doctors to put Clint in a coma. That's because you weren't here. Did you know that Clint made you his medical proxy, and that if you're not around, that happy duty falls to me? Because a heads up would have been nice."
For a moment Bruce couldn't answer, because, honestly, he'd had no idea. He might be Clint's doctor, officially, but that didn't mean he'd ever looked at who was listed as medical proxy. So far Clint had either been aware enough to make his own decisions or requiring rapid, emergency intervention. Neither of those situations would have meant that he needed to check who Clint had listed as his proxy. In any case, Bruce had rather assumed that it was Natasha.
"I didn't know, Tony. I didn't even know it was me, let alone that he'd taken into account the possibility that I might not be available."
The fight seemed to go out of Tony. He was still wearing the long sleeved black t-shirt that he wore under his armour, and Bruce knew that he'd walked out of the armour and straight into his lab. He moved back towards the scanner.
"Sorry, Bruce. I guess it's been a long day," said Tony.
"Tony, when did you last get a proper night's sleep?" asked Bruce.
"What? You want to do this now? With Clint lying downstairs in a coma?" Tony replied, answering a question with a question, and totally avoiding it in the process.
"Everything that can be done for Clint is being done," said Bruce. "You got maybe four hours back in DC. It's nearly midnight now. That's a long time to go without proper sleep."
"I don't have time for this," said Tony, pulling open the draw of one of his closest tool chests and searching for something.
Steve put a stop to that by removing Tony's hand from the draw and shutting the tool chest. "If you're so tired that you make a mistake, it won't help Clint. Viper's in custody. Hydra will need to regroup before they can do anything. Clint's not in pain and has round the clock care. We should all get some rest. We'll come back to this tomorrow."
Tony snatched his hand away from the Super Soldier. "News flash, I'm a grown man who can decide his own working hours."
"Our friends have a good case," said Thor. "We should all sleep while in the eye of the storm. There may not be another opportunity later."
"Even the demigod is against me," muttered Tony, but he did put down his tools. "Okay, you win. Let's get some sleep."
"Jarvis, could you please make sure that you don't let Tony back into the labs for at least six hours," Bruce said as he, Steve and Thor escorted Tony into the corridor.
"Yes, sir," said Jarvis.
"Traitor," grumbled Tony, but it was reasonably good natured, so Bruce knew that they'd won this round. They were all tired, even those of the party with superpowers, which meant that Tony had to be dead on his feet.
Bruce saw everyone back to their respective apartments and then headed to his own. The green door with the gamma symbol on it was becoming rather comforting of late. Inside, Tony had taken as much care with this apartment as he had with the others. The library was a particular source of joy to Bruce, and Tony had filled it with books and the latest scientific journals in Bruce's chose fields of expertise. However, tonight he just wanted to sleep, so he headed straight for the bedroom.
Thankfully Tony's insistence on green had only got as far as the hall and the rest of the apartment was decorated in other colours. Bruce flopped down on his bed without even turning the light on.
"Jarvis, wake me when Tony gets up or at 8am, whichever comes first," said Bruce.
"Yes, Doctor Banner," said Jarvis.
"Thanks, Jarvis," said Bruce. He fell asleep and dreamed of swimming with big powerful strokes. For once his dreams weren't of the horror of being shot at, which was a common occurrence after being the Hulk. This time he could see the Quinjet flying nearby and Thor hanging out of the back waving at him.
He was awoken several hours later by Jarvis telling him that it was 7am and Sir was getting up. He grudgingly pulled himself out of bed and peeled off the clothes that he'd slept in the night before. He showered and headed down to the Common Room kitchen where he was fairly certain Tony would be having breakfast. He really needed some tea before he could consider himself compos mentis and ready to deal with whatever today threw at him.
The kitchen wasn't empty when he entered it. Thor was already there, consuming pop tarts and Steve was cooking a massive pan of fried eggs and bacon. Both of them ate vast amounts, as did Bruce after a transformation into the Hulk. Steve served up three plates of food, of a suitable size for the three Avengers. He set out a fourth plate and Tony appeared a few moments later, clearly slightly surprised to find everyone else up. He was even more surprised when Steve served up bacon, eggs and toast at the table where Bruce was currently nursing a hot mug of tea.
"What is this? When did you start cooking?" asked Tony, grabbing the coffee pot and filling a mug.
"Frying bacon really isn't hard," said Steve. "I thought we could all use a proper breakfast this morning."
The four men tucked into breakfast, although only Thor managed to finish it all. Tony didn't even get through half of it, being the only one with a normal metabolism amongst the four of them.
"Doctor Banner, you have a visitor waiting for you in reception," said Jarvis.
"A visitor?" asked Bruce, puzzled. "I don't think I even know anyone in New York outside of the Tower. Did they give a name?"
"Yes, sir," said Jarvis. "She stated her name as Doctor Elizabeth Ross."
Bruce couldn't think for a moment. His mouth formed a word without engaging his brain in the process. "Betty."
This was really going to put the cat amongst the pigeons, and he didn't feel ready to face her. He didn't have time right now to deal with this either. His plan for today had been to work on the scanner and look into Tony's new plans for the neural regenerator. He'd also ear marked an hour to spend sitting talking to Clint, none of that included a reunion with his ex-girlfriend.
"Betty?" asked Tony, "as in your girlfriend, Betty.
"Ex-girlfriend," said Bruce.
"Girlfriend?" asked Steve. "I didn't know that…"
"I had one?" finished Bruce. "The Hulk sort of put an end to that. Jarvis, could you tell her that now isn't a good time."
"Jarvis, don't you dare," said Tony. "I'd like to meet her. Tell her to come up to the penthouse. Doctor Banner can join us if he wants to."
"Yes, sir," replied Jarvis. "Doctor Ross is on her way."
"Tony…" began Bruce.
"Look, you didn't let me give up on Pepper. I think this is another job for Avengers Relationship Counselling. Let's at least go talk to her," said Tony.
Bruce looked at Thor and Steve, hoping for some kind of backup that Tony was just being Tony again.
"I actually agree with him," said Steve.
"My experience with Midgardian women is limited, but I see no reason not to talk with her. Jane and I discovered many commonalities through talking with one another," said Thor.
"Commonalities?" asked Tony, with raised eyebrows. Thor just smiled, and went back to eating.
Bruce stood. "Come on then, let's get this over with. I'll say hi and goodbye and we can get back to saving Clint's life."
"That is not the attitude, Bruce," said Tony, as he guided Bruce towards the elevator.
"Tony, we broke up because I turn into a green monster," said Bruce.
"Only when you're angry," said Tony, as they stepped into the elevator and Tony hit the button for the Penthouse. "The rest of the time you're actually one of the more sane people I've met recently."
"The other people you've met recently are a Norse god, a super soldier, a guy who thinks a bow and arrow is the ultimate weapon and a Russian spy," said Bruce, wryly.
"You may have a point there," replied Tony.
The doors from the elevator to the main lounge of the penthouse opened and Bruce could see Betty standing there, outlined by the morning light. He stood in the doorway, on the threshold of the elevator as Tony stepped through and greeted the love of his life enthusiastically.
"Doctor Ross, I'd say that I've heard so much about you, but Bruce has been somewhat less than talkative," said Tony, holding out a hand to shake Betty's. Betty smiled and shook Tony's hand but didn't reply, she was looking towards Bruce.
Tony also looked towards Bruce. "Okay, I'll leave you to it. I've got work to do… in the lab."
Bruce persuaded his feet to walk a step forwards so that he was no longer in the elevator. He hardly noticed Tony leaving at all.
"Bruce…" said Betty, taking half a step towards him.
"How did you find me?" he asked.
"I saw the battle for New York, and that the Hulk was there. I assumed that you'd gone on the run again, but I thought it might be worth seeing if Tony Stark knew anything. He's the only one of the Avengers that I knew the name of. Stark Industries wasn't exactly enthusiastic about putting me in touch with him, even when I gave them my academic credentials. A couple of days ago I got a call from someone called Jarvis who said they were from Stark Industries and that I should come to Avengers Tower today." Betty took his hands in hers.
Bruce looked up at the ceiling. "Jarvis, huh?"
"Do you know who that is?"
"Jarvis, introduce yourself to Doctor Ross."
"Good morning, Doctor Ross. I apologise for the subterfuge. I am Tony Stark's AI. I control computer operations within the Tower and the Iron Man suit, as required."
"A computer called me? That's amazing," said Betty, looking up at the ceiling too.
"Yes, amazing," said Bruce, with a little bit of annoyance, but he was remembering all the times that he'd looked up Betty's page on her university website. Jarvis had apparently paid attention.
"I apologise if I overstepped my authority, Doctor Banner," said Jarvis.
"It's okay, Jarvis," said Bruce. He sort of led Betty to the couch and then went to the kitchen and made tea. Betty watched him in silence for a while.
Bruce brought the tea to the table and then sat down beside Betty. "Nothing's changed, Betty. I haven't found a cure and I only have limited control."
"You know that I don't care about that. I always wanted to keep trying to make it work. You're the one who didn't come back," said Betty.
"I couldn't," replied Bruce, looking down at his hands. "I wasn't sure that I could keep you safe. Your father wasn't just going to give up looking for me either. It's only because SHIELD got involved that he isn't still chasing me. Then I got involved with the Avengers and if anything, this is more dangerous." He was finding this a lot harder than he'd ever thought it would be.
"Bruce, you know how I feel about you," said Betty.
"Yes, and I feel the same way about you, but I'm not the same man that I used to be. I'm literally a monster…"
"It doesn't matter to me. What happened to you was an accident…"
"No, it was a dangerous experiment that I should never have attempted. It's my own fault. I was reckless and now I'm paying for my mistake, but you shouldn't have to as well," said Bruce, turning his head away from Betty.
"Bruce, we were a partnership," said Betty, trying to move so that she could look Bruce in the eyes. "I'd like to be that again. I'd like to at least try."
Bruce squeezed Betty's hand and shook his head. "I hurt one of the Avengers. I nearly left them then."
"The Hulk wouldn't hurt me."
"It might not be intentional. With the Black Widow, it was a mistake, an accident I think, but the Hulk isn't careful. He's a force of nature."
"Then, I'll deal with that," said Betty. "I've got a hotel booked here for the week. I wasn't expecting to just walk in here and for it all to be like it was. I knew it would take time."
Bruce nodded. "Jarvis picked a really bad week to ask you to come here. One of the Avengers is ill, and I've been trying to help him. Actually, we could use your help. We're trying to develop a neural regenerator, and there's a Gamma radiation component."
Betty looked interested. "Perhaps we could make use of some of my research into increased healing rates. I brought a data stick with me, I wondered if it might help with your search for a cure." She fumbled in her purse for a moment and then pulled out a USB data stick.
Bruce looked around for a laptop, knowing that Tony had to have one lying around. He found one under the table, opened the holographic display (this was one of Tony's laptops after all) and plugged in the data stick.
Bruce looked at the data for a few minutes. "You've been working hard on this. I hadn't realised that you'd been able to make this level of progress. This might actually be the missing piece of the puzzle. Come on, we need to show this to Tony."
Tony hadn't really expected Bruce to join him in the lab that morning. He'd expected him and Betty to spend the morning talking things through, and then maybe heading out for lunch together. Instead Bruce was now dashing into his lab with Doctor Ross a few steps behind him and waving a data stick about.
"Tony, you've got to see this," said Bruce. "Betty brought her most recent research. This is part of the project that we were working on before I took a wrong turn and ended up creating the Hulk. Don't worry, this is the bit that isn't dangerous."
Tony raised his eyebrows as he accepted the data stick and got Jarvis to display its contents. "Take me through what I'm looking at."
Betty then explained the contents of the data stick and how, since she'd last seen Bruce, she'd picked up their old research again. She'd been working on cell regeneration using low levels of gamma radiation. The army had wanted to take this research and create super soldiers, but Betty thought it had more important applications in therapeutic healing and so had decided to direct it in a more positive way.
Tony's eyes widened as he got further into the research. "This is it. This is what we needed to complete the neural regenerator."
"I was worried that I was seeing something that wasn't there," said Bruce.
"Jarvis, new parts list," said Tony, his mind setting off small fireworks as it worked with the new ideas that it had just been fed. He gave Jarvis the new list of parts, and looked at the scanner.
"Okay, we need to get the scanner finished so that we can map Clint's brain accurately. I reckon we've got half an hour's work left, and Erica should be here soon. Bruce, can you check in with Doctor Henderson, make sure that Clint's stable and then get him moved down here."
Bruce nodded. "I'll talk to him. You going to be okay here?" He asked Betty.
Betty looked around her and smiled. "This is probably the best equipped lab that I've ever seen. I think I'll be fine."
Bruce returned the smile. "Okay, just don't let Tony talk you into any experiments that involve explosives or the Iron Man repulsors."
Tony glared at Bruce, before turning back to Betty. "Doctor Ross, I'm guessing you'd be fine with helping me with the final calibrations for the scanner," said Tony.
"Of course, Mr Stark," said Betty, already looking at the machine. The two of them worked together until Jarvis interrupted them.
"Sir, a Quinjet is requesting clearance to land at Avengers Tower. Agent Romanoff is incoming."
Tony's felt a small pang of guilt. "Shit. She's back." He looked at Betty. "Are you okay to finish this without me?"
Betty nodded. "It's pretty simple from here. I've had enough experience of medical technology that I can handle it."
"Okay, I'll be back as soon as I've dealt with this," said Tony. "Jarvis, I think I'm going to need backup on this one."
"Yes, sir."
Steve had left breakfast and gone to visit Clint. He'd stopped off at the archer's apartment and retrieved one of the books that Tony had placed on the shelves. Steve had seen Clint sitting around the Tower reading on a number of occasions, so he knew that books were something that he enjoyed and it wasn't just Tony finding something to fill the shelves. Getting access to the apartment had required a short discussion with Jarvis as, under normal circumstances, no one was allowed to access an apartment without permission of the owner. Jarvis agreed that this was an exceptional circumstance.
Steve had browsed the shelves and found a number of books on archery. The one he'd picked was about the craft of making bows and Steve reckoned that it would be something that Clint might at least have a passing interest in. He had remembered a conversation in which Clint had described how he made his own arrows and this seemed to be a similar topic. He sat down at Clint's bedside and opened the book to the first page.
The archer was still except for the rise and fall of his chest in time with the ventilator. The room was filled with background sounds of Clint's playlist of pop songs and the quiet beeps of the monitors that kept watch over him.
"If I was more creative then I'd probably just sit here and tell you what's been going on," said Steve to his unconscious team mate. "Well, I suppose I could do that anyway. Tony's still working on his scanner, but I think he said he'd have it finished this morning. He seems to think that he can upgrade it to become a neural regenerator; I have no idea what that is. Tony reckons that it'll fix you, but it might take some time to get it working.
"Bruce's girlfriend Betty turned up at the Tower this morning, which seemed to create some waves. I guess those two have a few issues to iron out. At least his girlfriend is still around. Poor Peggy's in England in an old folks home and I haven't even plucked up the courage to go and see her. I did wonder if it was her that you were talking about, but you said "he" not "she". I know you did your best Clint, but it would have been nice to have more to go on than just "he's alive"."
Steve sighed. He wasn't going to get an answer out of the person that he was talking to.
"Anyway, I brought one of your books, so I'll read to you. I hope you like hearing about how bows are made."
Steve began to read. "The basic elements of a bow are a pair of curved elastic limbs, traditionally made from wood, joined by a riser." He kept going until Thor stepped into the room two hours later to take over. Steve left the book on the table beside Clint's bed, although Thor still found reading English a little tricky, so he guessed that he wouldn't continue with the book. Someone else might pick it up.
Jarvis alerted him to the next problem. "Captain Rogers, the Quinjet carrying Agent Romanoff just landed."
"Have you told Tony?"
"Yes, Captain, he is on his way to the landing pad. However he requested backup."
"Yeah, I can guess why," said Steve. He wouldn't have particularly wanted to tell Natasha that he'd told the doctors to put Clint in a coma either. Steve met Tony in the Common Room, where they waited for Natasha.
Tony looked a little nervous. "I thought I should have a witness in case she tries to murder me."
"Good call," said Steve.
They watched through the windows as Natasha jumped down from the Quinjet and pulled open the door from the landing pad that led into the Tower.
"How's Clint?" was the first thing she wanted to know, as she stepped through the door into the Common Room. She didn't even wait for the door to close behind her.
"He's not so good," said Tony, and then stopped for a second to take a deep breath. "The meningitis is back." Steve watched as the usually talkative billionaire failed to find the words to explain.
Steve decided that he'd better take over this particular duty, Tony was struggling and Natasha was beginning to panic. He could see it in her eyes, although it was well hidden behind her professional, spy exterior.
"The doctors have him in a medically induced coma," said Steve, seeing no reason to sugar-coat things for Natasha. She already knew that Clint was seriously ill. "They're hoping it will give his brain time to rest up and recover from the current bout of meningitis. It looks pretty alarming, but he's comfortable and stable for now."
If Steve hadn't known Natasha quite well by this point, he'd have missed the look of alarm that passed across her face. It was quickly schooled into mild concern.
"Clint's a fighter," said Natasha. "What about the knife wounds?"
"All cleaned and stitched and no sign of any poisons. The ones on his feet are going to cause him some trouble while they heal, but he shouldn't have any long term issues," said Steve.
Tony nodded in confirmation. He had his arms crossed and wrapped around his body.
"Apart from more fuel for his PTSD," said Natasha.
Steve sighed. "Yes, apart from that. He's got a couple of broken ribs too, but it'll heal too."
"If he'd just stayed put…" said Tony, and then shook his head. "If I'd got Jarvis to let me know if he left the building, none of this would have happened." Steve hadn't considered that maybe Tony was feeling just as guilty as Steve felt about Clint's condition but for different reasons and that perhaps that was why he'd snapped at Bruce the previous evening.
"No one's blaming you, Tony," said Steve.
"I'm blaming me," said Tony. "Anyway, the scanner's ready. We just need to check in with the doctors and see if Clint's stable enough to use it. Erica should be here within the hour. And in a surprise turn of events, Bruce's ex-girlfriend may have the key to completing the neural regenerator. We may actually be able to fix Hawkeye."
"Great, well get on it, Stark," said Natasha.
"We are," said Tony, with a little shortness in his tone. "But it's going to take time to build and we'll need the accurate results from the scanner."
"How did your interrogation go?" asked Steve.
"Viper isn't talking," said Natasha. "But we expected that. Thor's civilian find, Doctor Mikalite, is being helpful though."
"What did he tell you?" asked Steve, intrigued.
"He's an expert in geology and seismic disturbance," said Natasha. "They had him working on a device that he thinks was supposed to create earthquakes. It was based on a simulator that he'd been prototyping so that he could study localised quakes in a testing environment. He says that he built several."
"What happened to them?" Steve was sure that this was the key to whatever Hydra had been planning.
"He doesn't know, but he did say that they'd have to be buried pretty deep to work. Fury already has half of SHIELD trying to work out how to track them down, but we don't know how imminent the threat is," said Natasha. "We could really use those memories of Clint's. He must know something or Viper wouldn't have tried to kill him."
Tony shook his head. "The scanner can't extract memories from someone who's unconscious. This is just so that we can get a better map of the damage that Loki's mind control did. Well, unless we can somehow persuade Clint to think about the right things whilst he's in a coma. Actually that may not be that far-fetched…"
Bruce picked that moment to walk into the room. "Tony, we're moving Clint down to the lab now. Thor and Erica are with him."
Tony visibly straightened. "Okay, let's get this show on the road."
"I'm coming too," said Natasha.
"I'd taken that as read," replied Tony. "You too, Steve, if you want to. Might as well make it a family outing."
Steve gave a reluctant nod.
The group traipsed down to the lab and entered to find Clint being gently moved onto the bed of the new scanner, with all the medical equipment that was keeping him in a coma and breathing attached. Steve noted that he now had headphones in his ears, probably still playing the music from his playlist that helped him deal with the memories that caused him pain. Erica was supervising the nurses, while a woman that Steve assumed was Doctor Betty Ross was getting the scanner set up. Thor was standing to one side, Mjolnir was in his hand and his stance suggested that he was on high alert. To Steve, he was clearly guarding Clint and he found that he was glad of that.
"Who's she?" asked Natasha, pointing to Betty and immediately suspicious.
"Natasha Romanoff, Doctor Elizabeth Ross, Doctor Elizabeth Ross, Natasha Romanoff," said Tony, rapidly as he moved towards Betty. "Apparently you get to call her Betty if you have the ability to turn into a giant green rage monster."
"Tony," said Bruce with a touch of warning. Betty just smiled at both of them.
"Betty's been helping us," added Bruce.
Tony looked up to check with one of the nurses and then to Erica. "Are we ready to do this thing?"
It appeared that they were, from the affirmative gestures that he got. Steve moved a little closer so that he could see what Tony could see. There was a small screen, which was displaying various data.
"Okay, let's give this a first pass and then we'll see if we can stimulate some memories," said Tony.
"Is that going to hurt him?" asked Natasha.
"It shouldn't," said Bruce, stood on the other side of the machine, monitoring more data. "He's drugged into a coma and that prevents him feeling anything."
"Let's just start with the basics," said Tony, pretty much shutting down any further discussion. "We don't even know if it's actually going to work yet, although this is me, so we're at a ninety-nine point nine per cent chance."
The scanner hummed into life and a ring shaped part of the machine moved down so that Clint's head was encircled.
"Erica, come and look at this," said Tony, summoning her with a gesture. Clearly this was because he was excited by something and not because he was worried.
"What is it?" asked Steve.
"I've never seen such detailed data," said Erica. "I can actually map all the pinch points that Loki's mind control created, and see the subsequent damage created by Clint trying to remember. The good news is that I think the anti-inflammatories are working, compared to yesterday's scan, I can see an improvement. I wouldn't have picked it up on a normal scan, but it's pretty clear on here."
"That's good news," said Bruce, perusing the data on his own screen in front of him. "This is amazing, Tony."
"My father, the genius, ladies and gentlemen. I have never been more glad the I inherited his intelligence as well as his staggering good looks. And it's not as amazing as it's about to be," said Tony. "I think if we ask Clint a question, we might get a response. What do we want to ask him?"
"You're sure this isn't going to hurt him more?" asked Natasha.
"Erica can keep an eye on inflammation now. If it gets any worse, we'll stop," said Tony.
Erica met Tony's eyes. "Yes, we will."
"No worries there, Erica, none of us want Clint in any more pain. Steve, do you want to do the honours?" asked Tony.
"Me? Why me?" asked Steve.
"Because Bruce, Erica and I need to monitor the output," replied Tony. "And I suspect Natasha would drop into interrogation mode, and Thor would just sound like Shakespeare in the park. We need someone with a calm tone of voice. Come on, get over here."
Thor growled his displeasure in Tony's direction, but didn't stray away from his guard position by the door of the lab. Steve rolled his eyes and took the few steps that he needed to stand beside Clint. He removed the headphones from Clint's ears, looking at Erica for confirmation that it was alright to do so.
"Hi Clint, it's Steve, I need to ask you some questions," he started, unsure how to approach this. He leaned in so that he was closer to the unconscious man. "We know Viper triggered some memories for you. Can you remember why?"
Steve looked at Tony. He'd just asked an unconscious man a question like he was expecting an answer, but of course he wasn't. "I feel like an idiot."
"Don't, it's working," said Tony. He turned the screen so that Steve could see a grainy monochrome image. It looked a little like Viper, but could have been any dark haired woman really.
"I guess that could be Viper. How's he doing, Erica?" asked Steve.
"I'm not seeing any deterioration, yet anyway," said Erica.
"Clint, you tried to tell me something. What were you trying to tell me? You said "he's still alive", who were you talking about?" asked Steve.
Tony shook his head. "I'm not getting anything. Just static. Either we're asking the wrong question or last time was a fluke and this isn't working."
"We started with the hard questions," said Erica. "Try asking him something easier."
"Like what?" asked Steve.
"What movie we watched last week?" suggested Bruce.
"Clint, do you remember watching the Maltese Falcon with me?"
"That got something," said Tony. "It's not much though, not really a memory, just a flash."
"I think he's too deeply unconscious," said Erica. "You're triggering something but he's not in the right state to continue the memory."
Tony sighed. "Then it doesn't matter what we ask him. We're not going to get any better answers. So either we step down his medication or we give up."
"We really need what he was trying to remember," said Natasha. "Without it we've got no idea what Hydra were planning and it must have been important. He knew how it would affect him. Clint's not stupid and he listened to what Bruce told him."
"Really? I could have sworn he ignored me," said Bruce. "Just like the rest of you do."
"He listened," said Natasha. "Even if he chose not to follow your advice, like the idiot that he is."
"We could step down his sedatives a little, bring him into a slightly higher state of consciousness perhaps," suggested Bruce. "What do you think, Erica? Can we do it without him feeling pain."
"If we're careful, it'll be a balancing act. If we don't step down enough, it won't help. Too much and he'll be in pain again, at least until he's had more time to heal," said Erica. "The alternative is that we try this again in a week when he's conscious."
Natasha shook her head. "By then Hydra will probably have done whatever they were planning."
Erica looked at Bruce. "It's your call."
"Decrease the drip rate by two drips a minute," said Bruce to Erica, and she complied.
"How long before it takes affect?" asked Tony.
"Probably about fifteen minutes or so," said Bruce.
"Okay, long enough to re-check all the calibrations against the data we've already got. The rest of you, talk amongst yourselves," said Tony.
Steve took a seat at a lab bench with Natasha and Thor, where the three of them watched the scientists going over data and checking the calibration of the machine. Natasha pulled out a StarkPad and began checking her email. Steve was tempted to go down a floor to get his newspaper, but for some reason his didn't want to leave the group at the moment. Thor located Tony's stash of midnight snacks and raided it. He seemed disappointed at the contents. Tony had some strange food fads, which mostly seemed to involve dried fruit of various types at the moment.
"I'm watching you, Goldilocks," said Tony. "If you eat your way through my entire stash, you'd better be willing to replace it."
"I can assure you that I would provide you with much better fare if I were to bring you food," said Thor, who had already eaten an entire packet of something berry shaped and was starting on another. Thor was still noticeably more tired than usual, but other than that, he seemed almost entirely recovered from Viper's poisoning of him.
The required fifteen minutes passed and Steve was summoned by Tony to try talking to Clint again.
"Clint, it's Steve again, I need you to remember what it was that you were trying to tell me. You said "he's still alive". Who were you talking about?"
Steve looked up at the screen, just as the medical monitors went wild and Clint's heart rate began to climb. Bruce shifted round to get a look at the readouts. However Steve was fixated on the screen that would display Clint's memories. He wasn't sure if he could believe his eyes as he watched a short scene play over and over again, as if Clint was stuck in a mental loop.
He watched two figures, one was already in the room, the other entered it. The first one looked a lot like Loki from his height and build, the second figure Steve recognised instantly. Although the image was grainy and blurred, in a palette of colours that were mostly blues, the figure that came into the room was red. Clint's memories had some interesting effects going on, but Steve would have recognised his old enemy anywhere. Clint had been trying to tell him that the Red Skull was still alive.