AN: welcome to 1213, AT, it's been a while. But look: extra long chapter!
Beta'd by the wonderful and eminently skilled Kadigan. Seriously, she's great.
Chapter Twenty Five: Gearing up.
At two in the afternoon, after three hours in the lab finishing up the prototype pacemaker, Tony and Bruce headed for the conference room on the highest level of Stark Industries. It was, fortunately, only a few floors below the workshop and Tony had no trouble getting there. Bruce watched carefully, ready to lend a shoulder or lean the billionaire against the elevator wall, and he could see the rough edges: that glazed expression for a minute or two after he stood up, a spike in the pain that was starting to etch itself into the creases around Tony's eyes.
In the elevator, Bruce tapped Tony's pocket, where his morphine button was stashed, and raised an eyebrow.
"Right, okay," Tony said, fishing it out and thumbing it. He looked exhausted, understandably, but they had to get this over with; they needed to get the surgery done, there would be no getting better, no 'if he could just rest'. No time for being soft.
Dr. Ross and his team were sitting around the conference table, talking intently. As he pushed the door open, he saw Tony shift in the corner of his eye; his spine straightened, his chin came up and that press-pleasing smile wiped his face clean of worry and exhaustion. Bruce stood stunned as this strange new Tony hoisted his fresh oxygen tank onto his hip and stalked into the room.
The prototype, complete with arc reactor, thunked down on the table in its padded box; all eyes swung towards it and the conversation flatlined.
"This is just the prototype; have a good look. The real thing will be built under sterile conditions tomorrow, assuming we don't have to do a complete re-design. So!" Tony flopped into the big chair at the head of the table, calling up the holographic display bedded in the table. "Top of the line biometrics, and I'm not talking FAA here, people –"
Bruce settle down to watch and listen; apparently, he was supposed to be the only person in the room who knew how bad Tony really felt.
Dr. Ross was intent on the prototype and immediately lifted it out of the box. His colleagues leaned in and Bruce watched them compare the physical object with Tony's brief. Bruce had insisted on there being an arc reactor in the prototype housing; Tony had looked at him sideways but mocked one up in five minutes, with some LEDs and perspex. It wasn't quite the same brilliant, broad spectrum light as the arcs' exotic particle decay, but it was the fitting that mattered, the light was just... Tony.
"What is this, on the stimulator?" Dr. Ross asked, holding up the atrial electrode and touching its rough surface.
"EMF. No wait, thats taken... MFE; Micro-field electrodes. Right size to fit between heart cells-" Bruce despaired of getting Tony to call them 'myocytes' and the professionals looked at Tony sideways for it. "-and deliver the current in a diffuse concentric wave simulating-"
Bruce was genuinely impressed when the Doc followed easily, pertinent questions and all. "The electrodes themselves are titanium?"
"100% rejection-proof," Tony grinned and tapped his existing arc reactor as proof, "and embedded into the silicone."
Dr. Ross nodded, frowning thoughtfully at the bundle of sensors, a quarter of which used the same array technology to detect nervous impulses.
"What about attachment? Won't the sutures disrupt any circuitry?" Bruce blinked at the surgical assistant who had asked and felt distinctly embarrassed, and then a little horrified; they hadn't thought of that, and once Tony heart was restarted, it would be moving all over the place and the whole point of this exercise was to reduce the number of moving objects in Tony's chest.
Tony added pre-perforated ridges to the edges of all the sensors without commenting.
Once the examination of the prototype was nearly complete, the discussion shifted to practical aspects of Tony's part in the surgery. Bruce was relieved to realise that the professionals found Tony's waking-bypass plans just as intimidating as he did.
"We'll have to paralyze you from the neck down to ensure the heart-lung machine remains undisturbed; I don't see how you can work like that, Mr. Stark."
Tony gave the surgical nurse (nice young woman, practical, thought Bruce, and probably utterly undeserving of this) a look that told volumes about how ridiculous he thought she was. "I can't, that's the point. I'll need use of my arms. That's where you come in." He smacked the table as he said it and a hologram sprung up: an anatomical diagram of the upper body musculature, with the Arc reactor superim - no. That was Tony's actual chest. Bruce had given JARVIS the information to build a diagram like that, he just hadn't realised what the AI would do with it. It was, of course, perfect, right down to the minor inflammatory damage of the blood vessels caused by the palladium poisoning. Tony's efficient gestures highlighted groups of muscles in red as he continued speaking: "These are the muscles that were cut in the initial surgery - outline scar tissue in red? Thanks. Attachment for the pectoralis major is provided by this ring, here." One of the reactor housing's components lit up; Bruce couldn't quite see how the ligamentous medial end of the muscle was finding purchase, but since Tony could still bench press and move his arms, it was a fair bet it was a damn good connection. The entry points from the initial shrapnel injury were just visible under the smooth and sure lines of surgical scars. Bruce would admit, if he had been asked at this point, that he was feeling a little green. "This one here -"
"The rectus abdominis, sir."
"Thank you, JARVIS. -attaches to this post, with three screws through the remainder of the lower sternum. They took six weeks to heal up; do not fuck with them."
"Mr Stark, you are looking at a twelve month recovery time, regardless of having to heal to titanium again." Dr. Ross interjected wryly. Bruce looked at him sideways; this guy was definitely worth hanging onto.
"Yeah, uh, no; last time we did this? Cave. Box of scraps. Three months."
"Dr. Yinsen had the option of opening your sternum; I'm going to have to saw through five of your ribs, in addition to cutting open your aorta, pulmonary artery and vein, and your vena cava, and that is before entering the atrial septum to extract the piece of shrapnel lodged inside. You're not even going to notice that we've transected your left pectoralis major. Twelve months, Mr. Stark."
Tony paused, blinking, as JARVIS helpfully outlined the planned surgical incisions - if you could call it that when saws were involved - and highlighted the sensor locations. There would be no getting at them without lifting off half his ribcage.
"Right." Tony visibly swallowed before looking away and then spent a moment massaging his temple. "I knew that. Right... just leave the reactor housing alone, there isn't an engineer on this planet who can fix it but me." At least not in the available timeframe, Bruce thought to himself. Well... there was Vanko, but he'd rather have the Other Guy doing surgery than Whiplash.
"Unfortunately, your plans lead me to believe you. Precisely what range of movement do you need?" Ross asked, slapping the technical drawings in his hand down on the table. The surgical nurse whose job description suddenly included handing Tony a soldering iron perked up; she was a find of Pepper's, shipped in from Princeton-Plainsboro, and had already been briefed on what was expected. She was after details now.
The engineer rattled off the exact number of degrees and in which plane they applied to, in the same engineering language he used to talk about the Iron Man suit. The doctors looked like he'd just spoken in C++; Bruce sighed and poked at his tablet to help JARVIS put together a model the doctors would actually be able to use.
"Oh; you're going to need your shoulder elevating..." The surgical nurse spoke up once they had waded through translation-with-visual-aid and cautiously fiddled with the new hologram, pushing the ball of its shoulder up three or four inches. "And you're not going to have rotator cuff function, so..." She pulled the elbow up on the left side. "If we fix your arm there, then you'll only need distal musculature."
"God, it's going to be like working with Butterfingers." Tony's comment made a wooshing noise as it flew over the doctors heads. Bruce chuckled and got a wink from Tony for it, before the billionaire plunged back into the discussion.
Bruce didn't exactly have much to contribute, at this point, so he distracted himself from his anxiety with designing an air sterilization system that would actually kill everything, rather than just 99%. Ionising radiation was good at that; both he and Steve really should be dead. The discussion wrapped up the issue of mobility and shifted to paralytic agents and oxygen saturations while he wasn't looking.
"And what happens if you have a stroke, during hour four or five? What will you do then?" Bruce looked up abruptly; young man, dark haired and with that bluster that meant he didn't quite know what his status was here. A quick look through the papers on the desk told him it was the heart-lung technician; his job was the one most affected by Tony's abnormal requirements. "You're not going to have medical hypothermia to protect you; you could lose motor function, comprehension, your engineering skills. You should at least train someone to finish the wiring."
Dr. Ross sat back from an examination of the circuit diagram to frown sternly at the speaker, but for all that he apparently didn't approve of the man's tone, he didn't actually intercede on Tony's behalf.
Bruce chanced a glance at Tony; the banked terror was almost invisible, but Bruce knew that of all the things Tony feared, losing his faculties was right up there with losing Pepper. He fished his phone out under the table and thumbed to JARVIS' obliging feed of Tony's vitals; the sharp spike in his breathing, a wild fluctuation in his galvanic skin response, the stuttering of the pacemaker as it tried and failed to respond to the adrenalin, all added up to fear. Unmitigated horror, and a body utterly unequipped to deal with the physical side of the response.
Time ticked by.
Slowly, Tony's vitals went from flirting with red back down to green and a brutal, devil-may-care grin spread across his face."Well, then I'll die on that table, and it will be all your fault."
Bruce had never seen Tony so harsh, so shark-like, not even under the scepter's influence, and the poor, mean-spirited doctor quailed.
"Alright!" Tony clapped, full of brittle energy; Bruce stood and pointedly tidied his copy of the references they were using. It was time to bring this to a close and send the new minions to prepare without the oppressive presence of the patient himself. "Off you go, chop chop! Work to do, I'm sure you have scalpels to sharpen, needles to sterilize, or something."
Also, Tony was about to keel over and had started slurring his words.
The doctors followed his lead and put their files back in order; JARVIS provided directions to the under-construction operating suite and they left. At the door, Dr. Ross quite literally took the heart-lung machine operator in hand with a firm grip on his shoulder; "I don't think you appreciate the complexity of what Mr. Stark's 'wiring', son. Have you ev-" The door swung shut behind them, cutting off the rest of the sentence.
Reassured by the exchange, Bruce thumbed his phone again, tapping the Captain America icon and hitting call.
Steve must have answered through JARVIS because his caller tag appeared on screen at the first ring. "Hi? Bruce?"
"Steve, Tony's going to need your help; we've worn him out."
"Now that just sounds suggestive," Tony interjected quietly from the head of the table. Bruce just raised an eyebrow at him and swapped the phone to his other hand, freeing his right to tilt Tony's face towards the light; his lips were still pink, he was fine, they were fine.
"I'll be right down; should I bring your bag?" Steve's voice had that strange rising-and-falling quality that was unique to JARVIS' roaming pick-up as it switched from microphone to microphone.
"Just yourself; he needs a lift."
"Ms Potts brought a wheelchair, but..."
"Just yourself, Steve."
The super soldier made a soft noise of agreement and the feed cut out; it wasn't quite the same as hanging up, but it was close enough.
Tony groaned and dropped his head back against the headrest. "JARVIS, keep this floor clear for the next... ten minutes? For me?"
"For you sir, anything." JARVIS replied with a tone Bruce couldn't quite place; either fond or sarcastic, but potentially both, too. Tony blinked up at JARVIS's nearest camera, set in the middle of the ceiling, and softened with gratitude, literally; he sunk a little lower in his chair and closed his eyes. After a minute, he rubbed irritably at the tube looped under his nose, almost managing to dislodge it.
"Leave it," Bruce warned lowly, putting his phone away and crouching to dial the oxygen up slightly. They should probably find a way of linking the O2 supply to Tony's stats, but no, there would be a lag in his pulse-ox meter when compared to ideal dosage; they would need a predictive algorithm...
Bruce was still thinking about it when Steve arrived, a minute and a half later. Tony had been disturbingly silent, but he revived a little when the doors opened and bickered quietly with the supersoldier.
Bruce trailed along at Steve's left shoulder, carrying the oxygen tank. Its case did have wheels, but it wasn't exactly heavy either.
XXXXXXXXXXX
Tony hadn't been selling himself short when he said he was light; Steve wouldn't have liked to spar with him on the best of days, not with the way he could just pick Tony up like a child. Steve's sandbags weighed more.
"C'mon, Cap; I won't hurt it. Besides, I could just make you a new one. A better one."
"Don't touch the shield, Tony. You can play with it after you're done making your own hardware." Maybe.
There's something innately awkward about elevator rides - Steve hitched Tony up slightly so the man's bony shoulder wasn't digging into his pec quite so hard - they didn't exactly invite conversation, and there wasn't anything else to look at apart from the other people whose personal space you were definitely inside. At least there weren't any mirrors in Tony's elevators. Then there really wasn't anywhere to put your eyes but your own feet. Or a cellphone; perhaps that was why Clint liked the little game-things.
Tony, of course, completely ignored this and squirmed enough to poke at Bruce's tablet computer, pulling the three of them even closer together. "No, no, look: run the radiation through there, or you'll lose half the input in cycling heat between the condenser and the scrubber."
Steve frowned and shifted his feet to get a look and give Tony a better angle; the screen was a mess of the symbolic language that, usually, only Tony and Bruce could understand. The crudely sketched stick figure in the box marked 'output' was a little concerning, however. "Is that supposed to be you?" Steve boosted Tony again; too much wriggling and not enough holding on. The billionaire slung an arm over Steve's shoulder absently and nodded. Ah, of course, Steve should have known; that extra circle around the stickman's central stick was supposed to be the arc reactor.
"Yep. We're going to revolutionise aseptic technique."
"I'm just going to pretend I know what that is..."
This comment, of course, led Bruce down the garden path, explaining about immunosuppression and airborne diseases and spores and antibiotic resistant bacteria and Steve just let the words sink in.
Dear God, Tony was going to be vulnerable.
XXXXXXXXXXX
It wasn't until the next morning that Tony met The Chair.
Blame Clint for the ominous way it was talked about; not long after Tony had fallen asleep on the couch -now a habit. They made it work- he had brought to their attention that it was a bought item. Tony had to tinker with his watches before he would wear them, not to mention his cars, or, god forbid, the Iron Man armor. That chair would have three different modes of locomotion, four different ways to kill a man, and at least one glowing, nuclear-fusion powered supercomputer by the end of the day if they didn't keep Tony distracted.
Steve, reluctantly, took responsibility for keeping the damn thing from gaining flying capabilities. Even JARVIS sounded relieved.
Tony's face when he emerged from the bathroom, fortunately mostly clothed, to see Steve leaning against the dresser with Tony's oxygen tank and The Chair, was priceless. "Oh no. No, no, no; is that- does that thing fold? Are you trying to- where's the, thing, you know," He made a gesture that could have meant 'Steve's going to blush redder than a tomato' but probably meant 'joystick'.
"That would be me. Come on, Bruce want's to go over the-" It's Steve's turn to make a vague gesture, "- you were making last night."
"But... but it has wheels."
"Tony, it's a wheelchair," Pepper chimed in from in front of the bathroom mirror, "What else would it have?"
"I don't know. Caterpillar tracks? Stephen Hawking has those, right? It could have repulsors. Oh! Or mag-lev." Tony eyed the contraption with a combination of appraisal and wariness that only Tony could pull of on one face. Steve did, at least, recognise the name this time; Coulson's reference had started making sense when the physicist cropped up in Tony's Science talk, more than once.
"NO, Tony, leave the chair alone. Steve, I have to run; with the Intellicrops merger coming up, I can't-" Pepper emerged from the bathroom hastily packing a purse.
"Go, Pep, we've got this." Tony tossed his soggy towel at the foot of his bed, where it landed with an unpleasant thump, and turned to face her. "Light a fire in their tailpipes, Ms Potts."
"Always, Mr Stark; be good." She kissed him quickly, leaving a smudge of lipstick that Tony wiped off with a smug thumb. Steve looked away to give them their moment. He was a little surprised when she turned to Steve and kissed him, rather more chastely, on the cheek; he had to lean down so she could reach, even with those shoes. "Look after him, for me?"
"Yes, ma'am."
She swept out in a flurry, already hooking something on her ear and calling to Natasha.
"Sit down before you fall down, Tony; Bruce only just signed off on the shower. He seemed to think you might fall over and break something important. Possibly your ego. I don't see it, personally," said Clint, still sprawled on the ridiculous bed in lounge pants, a sweater and the blanket off the back of the sofa. Pepper and Tony had, once again, accrued people overnight.
Tony flopped gracelessly into the wheelchair; fortunately, Steve had locked it so at least it didn't go rolling backwards. The billionaire was still bare-chested, which just made the difficulty he was having breathing all the more obvious, and Steve held out the monitoring vest. Tony didn't put it on, but he took it agreeably enough; there was pain in everything from the set of his shoulders to the twitching of his fingers over the vest's technology, so Steve wasn't particularly surprised.
His wrist was blue around the, now rather soggy, band-aid over the hole left by the IV; bad business, but Tony had pulled at it in his sleep and the vein had bled under the skin. Bruce had been guilt-ridden, but it hadn't actually been anyone's fault. Natasha had been awake and heard the tape tear and Tony managed to avoid actually bleeding on anything.
The only problem was that Tony was now a little low on painkillers; Bruce would have more for him, in the kitchen.
"Can I-"
"No." Steve interrupted the archer before he could even finish the sentence. That was not a road they wanted to go down; god knew what mad scheme Tony and Clint would manage between them, massive doses of morphine or no.
"But it's jus-"
"No, Clint. Besides, there's waffles, and they'll be stone cold if we don't get on with it." They had ordered from Le Petit Canard again; Steve hadn't found something they wouldn't deliver yet, despite, to his dismay, Clint's concerted attempt to have them eating squid at least once a day after the Gulf of Mexico incident.
Who knew you could get squid on a pizza?
"Oh Steve, my great and noble Prince, saving me from the nefarious Robin Hood, in the name of waffles! On! Fine steed; to the field of battle! May your spoon be forever syrup'ed," Tony said over his shoulder as Clint vanished around the corner.
"For one," Steve commented as he maneuvered through the door which Clint had obligingly wedged open, "Robin Hood was one of the good guys; and two, how can I be a prince and a horse, at the same time?"
"Mad skills, Steve, mad skills and biceps." Tony was making a good show of 'I'm only letting Steve push me because I'm working' by fiddling with the monitoring vest. By the time they made it to Tony's kitchen - which was rapidly becoming the kitchen as various and sundry Avengers settled in and added favorite teas and mugs to the cupboards - Bruce had a new morphine line ready and was washing his hands in the sink. Steve pushed Tony up to the table and left them to it.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
"But it'll get in the way." Tony prodded the padded plastic brace Bruce wanted to strap over his wrist distrustfully. Supposedly, it would protect the new IV and hopefully make it last longer than a day.
"I can't imagine the other one's going to feel any better; the bruising is the size of my palm."
Tony looked down at his blue-ish arm and wiggled his fingers; alright, fair point...
"Look, Tony," Bruce muttered confidentially, "there's already scarring on your veins - don't look at me like that, I can tell it was a long time ago - you really don't need to make that any worse."
Tony scowled half-heartedly but conceded the point. At least the old track marks weren't visible. He shrugged the vest on, shivering a little as the internal surface electrodes made contact with his skin, and hooked up the arc reactor. Once he was buckled in, he heard the dishwasher start up; good old JARVIS, always keeping tabs.
He let Bruce deck him out with oxygen and then held out his un-bruised arm for the morphine; "We're nearly there, aren't we?" he mumbled, his limbs going loose as the oxygen made breathing less of a chore. He didn't even flinch when the needle went in, looking over at Clint and Steve instead, who were investigating the effects of combining different grades of chocolate with raspberries. Clint prefered white, while Steve liked milk.
"Yes, yes we are. Think you can hold onto this one until Thursday?" Bruce said with a grin that could be amusement, but was probably nerves.
"I'm sure I'll manage."
Once Bruce was done taping up the new morphine tube he helped Tony into a zip-up sweater that was decidedly too big to be from his own wardrobe. Also, the cuffs were worn where someone had picked at them and crumpled them in a fist. He looked sideways at Clint's broad shoulders; the archer caught him looking and smirked so Tony succinctly pulled the sleeves down over his hands and scrumpled them like a teenager. Clint had the temerity to look amused.
Tony was, excusably, distracted from this little by-play when sweet, sweet relief spread through his body. He happily slumped down in his chair and closed his eyes.
Now, what would really make his day would be an enormous mug of coffee, black, two sugars. He could put up with the dark chocolate, cream and raspberry-filled monstrosity that Bruce handed him, though.
"Alright, so I moved the condenser and JARVIS puts the efficiency at 87%," Bruce commented, putting a tablet with projection capability on the table between them.
"Mmph, 's good." Tony shoved his mouthful into one cheek to talk and pulled up the hologram of the surgical suite. "If we wire it into the central riser it can use all the power it wants without disturbing the voltage available to anything else."
Bruce nodded, chewing on a spoonful of his cereal. "Most of the equipment has surge-protection, that shouldn't be an issue-"
Tony deadpanned, mouth full and still managing to convey disdain. Bruce changed tacks, grinning; "Ideally, the unit should fit into the sterile canopy itself, but the shielding is a little heavy-"
"'s an H beam, here," Tony gestured at the hologram and it obligingly went wire-frame. "'couple of suspensor bolts and we'll be fine. How'd you fix the airflow convection issue?"
"LEDs in the surgical lamps."
"What -? You know what? I don't even want to know. You done with the trail-mix? Lets go build a laser." Tony had eaten as much as he wanted, and if someone had a problem with that they could get him a smoothie or something, and wheeled himself backwards, away from the table. Hey; bonus points for having the O2 attached to the wheelchair. He felt a sort of glee at being able to move at a decent speed without feeling the need to fall over on Steve and turned the chair on the spot to get a feel for it.
"Whoa, slow down, Tony; thats just the morphine talking." Bruce asked, bringing his bowl with him. "Also; why do we need a laser?"
"Awww, you always spoil my fun," Tony whined, though he did wheel himself towards the elevator at a more sedate pace. "Soldering. When I said laser, I may have meant opticfiber-transmission IR source."
"To solve the heft issue?" Bruce mumbled, through a mouthful.
Tony nodded. "We can probably get it down to fifteen grams, if we use the new Hamamatsu prototypes I've got lying around the workshop."
"Aren't those the Immunochromatograph people?" the scientist asked, before drinking the last of his milk and leaving his bowl on a sideboard to pick up later and joining Tony in the elevator.
"Yep. Been working with them on their NIR imaging line and they sent over some samples for long-wave optical transmission when they got footage of the unibeam. Very courteous people, the Japanese." Tony pushed the button for the 24th floor but Bruce held the doors open.
Bruce nodded down the hallway, where Steve was emerging from the kitchen. "Just give Steve a minute, unless you gave Dummy clearance to emerge from the workshop without telling me."
"Ah, heavy lifting. JARVIS?"
"You may release the door, Dr. Banner; I will hold the elevator."
"Thanks JARVIS," Steve said, squeezing in next to the wheelchair. Tony could feel him eying the handles; seriously, he was going to take a bolt cutter to them if anyone used them as an excuse to invalid him.
"The recovery room's nearly finished; Pepper backed you on the holojectors," Bruce commented as they passed the 34th floor.
"Hah, take that. You haven't seen me bored, Brucie: it is not a good look."
"We brought a sofa up too, I hope that's alright. Abby was bringing it up to spec when Bruce called me, yesterday." Steve said, shifting the wheelchair forwards a little and getting behind it. Tony bristled and tucked his arms over his chest irritably.
"Wait, what? She's a vacuum cleaner that likes small, dark spaces, why is she cleaning a sofa?" Tony queried, twisting to look up at Steve over his left shoulder.
"Uh, Clint was there?" Steve asked in a bemused tone, shrugging. The vision in Tony's right eye greyed out and he was forced to face forwards again.
"Well, she's not agoraphobic..." He missed the remainder of the trip to the new surgical suite, pulling his phone out of his pocket and sending the new bot a request for a maintenance report instead. Just in case.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
It was a long, physically tiring day; Tony spent a not-insignificant amount of time sitting on Steve's shoulders while he wired in a new sensor array for JARVIS. Even if no one could work on the reactor directly, JARVIS could finish the coding and get the pre-loaded software running in a pinch. Fortunately, when Steve put him back down, he made him sit in the chair and Tony could micro-nap in between jobs without being noticed.
At least, he thought he wasn't noticed.
The pain crept up on him and ebbed again when he pressed his button, but eventually he maxed out and he figured, fuck it, he was going to take a nap until he was allowed more. Someone must have wheeled him upstairs while he was snoozing, because he woke up on the sofa, draped ignobly against Clint's chest.
Since he was, obviously, still in the Twilight Zone, he just blinked slowly and went back to sleep; someone had topped off his morphine, he was good for it.