I have seen the future and it is very much like the present - only longer. - Kehlog Albran

"Dr. Doom is throwing another hissy fit! Do we really have time to worry about Storm?"

As reluctant as he was to admit, Director Fury was in no great hurry to see Agent Storm terminated. Knocked senseless a few times, but not terminated. She had been a good agent for the most part, other than running away one or twice. Storm knew so many well-connected people that it was hard to find an agent that was more efficient than she.

The Council, the head cheeses all shiny and polished on their monitors, bickered nastily back and forth. They –the Council and Fury- had been back and forth at each other for almost an hour. Normally, any agent who messed up in the degree and caliber Storm had would be fired, jailed, or killed, but of course, Storm wasn't a normal agent. She was SHIELD's experiment and responsibility, in a sense.

"She killed her sister, Director, and caused a lot of damage," the Council said, speaking collectively. "She should have been terminated after Detroit last year, but we took your advice then, and now this happened."

"If it hadn't been for your orders, she would never have had the power to create this level of destruction," Fury retaliated. Fury's idea did not often get rejected, and even fewer still were the rejections sustained. "Storm is SHIELD's responsibility, and is therefore not liable for her actions. In any case, she did her job. Both marks are dead."

Fury knew that his argument was shaky at best, but he had gotten his way more often than not on less of a case than Storm's. Besides, whether the council liked it or not, Storm was an invaluable ally, if she could even be called an ally.

The Council deliberated. "If we allow her to live, she will be solely your responsibility, Director. Any misstep will not only be on her head, it will be on yours as well."

Fury was resolute in his stance and of a sure voice. "I am willing to take that responsibility. She may be trouble, but it seems rather stupid to waste a valuable resource."

One of the Councilmen, one who dared to be different, spoke up. "Let's not be so hasty in condemning the girl. It is as the Director has said: it was our decision to entrust Storm with these abilities. In fact, Storm may prove beneficial in preventing Dr. Banner from transforming. Let us also not forget how pertinent she was in gleaning information from the agent we captured in Budapest."

The main Councilman spoke, "Any misstep, Director. Any mistake at all and it's your ass."

The monitors flickered off, but Fury was in no way dismayed by the subtle threats the Council had given. He was irreplaceable, and he was well aware of that.

Fury departed from the room in which he'd held his meeting with the council, only to be faced with his next order of business. Ranger and Storm stood silent, resolute and watchful. Storm was not visibly nervous to a normal person, but to anyone in the room, to those who had been trained to sense fear in the most iron-willed of men, it was obvious that she was anxious to hear her future.

"So, what'll it be, Director? Sodium phenobarbital, firing squad, a good old-fashioned hanging, or will you just get Ranger to push me off the deck of the Helicarrier?" Storm asked, somehow still finding humor in the face of her possible imminent demise.

Fury halted his stroll in front of her, crossing him arms. His good eye stared at her with that same powerful intensity that he used no matter the situation. "Take a vacation, Storm."

Storm was rather puzzled, as was Ranger, who had been convinced that there was no hope for her mentor.

"I thought the Council was lobbying for my termination?" Stella asked, relieved of some of the pressure on her shoulders.'

He fixed her with one of his reprimanding stares. "I would politely suggest, Storm, that you take Dr. Banner on a long vacation. I'm sure Mr. Stark will continue to hold your position as head of human resources."

Ranger stepped up to bat. "You want her to run away?"

"Yes. Run away and get out of my hair," Fury said, shooting Ranger a glace when she snickered very softly. "And don't do anything stupid. If I have to come find you, I'll terminate your ass personally."

Well, not really. Fury didn't do that anymore.

Bruce was doing what he did best – science. In fact, he was mixing up his own personal toilet cleanser. At one point in his life, he had been getting paid to do this, and had come up with some of the strongest, foulest industrial strength mixes on the market. Now he did it simply because he knew what had gone into many of the commercial toilet cleansing products, and chose to create something that didn't burn the skin off of his privates on the fumes alone.

His concentration could not be broken, not even by JARVIS's incessant calling. Tony requested his presence here, Pepper needed him there, Tony this, Tony that, too many responsibilities at once. He knew better than to push himself to comply with all of the demands at once. It was hazardous to his health, not to mention the health of everyone in the building.

The chemical fumes weren't doing much to help health-wise, but it was better than turning into a huge green rage monster.

Due to the single-minded intensity he exhibited when concentrating on a project, Bruce honestly didn't hear the door to the lab open.

Tony, who had essentially become Bruce's best friend, strode in, grumbling about the lousy job his planners were doing in choosing a color scheme for her revamped ballroom. Most people would have thought the man would have been more upset at the fact that an entire floor of his building had been destroyed, but Bruce knew better. Tony had been forced to hand over the blueprints to that floor – he saw this as an opportunity to royally screw with SHIELD.

However, Bruce also knew that Tony Stark would not have walked all the way through the top ten floors of R&D to whine about wallpaper. Maybe if it had been about the new floor plan, but not wallpaper.

Tony extracted a tiny black box from his pocket and slapped it on the table.

"I don't know where you found the time to look for this," he said solemnly, "but you're breaking my heart, Brucie. I thought we were soulmates, man. How could you do this to me?"

Bruce snatched the box away and stuffed it down deep within the confines of his pocket. "Shut up, you're not funny."

"Of course I am. I'm hysterical," Tony replied dismissively. "You better hope I'm a riot, since I'll probably be giving your best man speech."

"Actually, JARVIS was my first candidate…"

"A candidate implies that there are options," Tony reminded him. "Being that I'm me, I'd say that rules out anyone else."

"I'd hate to interrupt your self-important tirade, but depending on the outcome of today, I might not even get to use this," Bruce reminded him quietly.

Bruce was a physicist, but he often found comfort in chemistry, simply because it was so much more than theorizing and solving equations. Chemistry was about the means to an end, and one slip-up could spell disaster. Chemistry took infinitesimal, careful precision and concentration. When he was troubled, he would transgress his first love and revert to his comfort zone.

His worry and anxiety over the fate of his girlfriend seemed as good a time as any to be mixing new toilet cleansers as if his paycheck depended on it.

"About that," Tony started, dumping himself down into one of the sterile plastic chairs that dotted the room, "If I'm worrying that you might attempt –and fail- to recruit someone else as your best man, wouldn't you draw the conclusion that I might possibly know something? Or are you too caught up in your chemistry set?"

"The answer to that should be fairly obvious," Bruce observed, gesturing down at his work. "I was trying to get away from the idea of the possibility."

Tony sighed. "The Council let her go. She's on the way here in a SHIELD helicopter right now."

For the first time in the days since the party, Tony saw a spark of hope in Bruce's eyes. The scientist had been sulking for days, wandering around as though his last link with humanity had been extinguished.

But it was certainly nice to see Bruce finally smile.

"So are you gonna use that hunk of bling today," Tony asked, spinning in his plastic chair, "or are you gonna keep beating around the bush?"

"I just… I was kind of waiting for the right time to give it to her," Bruce said, shoving his hand down deep into his pocket. He rubbed the little black velvet box between his fingers, feeling the smooth slickness of the material slide past his digits.

"She's back, she's yours. What better time than now?" Tony asked. He stopped spinning and took the tools from Bruce's hands. "Normally I'm not one to push matrimony on anyone, but I get to plan the bachelor party."

They were away from everyone, in a secluded sort of indoor patio where cameras and microphones hadn't followed them. It was quiet, blissfully so, and they had brought food up onto the patio. In place of the outdoors, there were windows overlooking the city. The sounds of the city didn't drift up though, and they sat curled up in comfortable silence, eating the food that smelled better than anything in the world.

Stella picked at her food sleepily. She wasn't very hungry, and all she really wanted to do was to get to bed. She'd looked in the mirror that morning, and at that moment became completely aware of just how deep the dark circles under her eyes went.

"Fury wants us to go on vacation," Stella said seriously, pushing her half-eaten plate of food to the side.

Bruce had finished his food and was leaning back, one hand folded across his stomach and the other still fingering the tiny box in his pocket. He cracked an eye open and smiled softly.

"And by vacation, he means?"

Stella sidled over to him, curling up in the crook of his arm. "Get out of his sight for a while and don't do anything stupid."

"And in which part of the globe should we carry out the Director's orders?" Bruce said, his tone teasing. He swept his fingers through her hair and kissed her forehead.

"How do you feel about Brazil?"

"Never been," he replied.

"Perfect."

They settled down together, content and snuggled deep in the warmth of each other. Bruce's heart pounded nervously, his pulse fluttering discontentedly beneath his skin. He wanted to bring the little box out, but it simply seemed out of place in the comfort of the setting. He wasn't too much of a romantic, but the setting just didn't seem quite, well, right.

So he kept the box in his pocket, and decided to wait for another day.

They didn't carry a lot of stuff with them. To be fair, neither Stella nor Bruce had much stuff to take with them. Each had a small sack packed, stuffed with only what was needed (and what Tony forced them to take).

Stella had a few changes of clothes and essentials, as did Bruce. Stella left most of her clothes at Stark Tower, since Tony had made them promise to return in three months. He had given them both phones and a wallet with cash in it, along with a debit card. He said it was for emergencies.

Tony's concern would have been touching if not for the fact that Stella had the sneaking suspicion that she would be hiring people when she returned.

Bruce had gone to India without a cent to his name and the clothes on his back, and one extra change of clothes. He hadn't needed anything else, and he was reluctant to take the money that Tony gave him. So he resolved to keep the cash and budget it, but to discreetly leave the debit card behind in his room.

Stella had gone to India with a phone full of friends. She still had a phone full of friends. She kept the clothes and left everything else. The best thing about having a phone full of friends was that every friend had more interest in her than he or she did in SHIELD.

And whether they knew it or not, Tony knew that they had left everything. He slipped a backup card in Bruce's sack when he wasn't looking.

Bruce didn't like airports and would rather die than get on another plane, so they one of Tony's cheaper cars.

The four of them -Bruce, Stella, Tony, and Pepper- stood out in front of Stark Tower, staring each other down somewhat suspiciously. Next to them, a white Cadillac idled loudly, its engine grumbling like a lion. Stella was fairly certain that Tony had probably put something in the Cadillac that they didn't want, but she decided not to check until later.

"Three months," Tony said, crossing his arms. "Or I'll come looking for you."

No one argued with Tony Stark.

"We'll be back," Bruce assured soothingly. He gave Tony a quick bro-hug and hugged Pepper as well.

"Or not," Stella joked. She gave Pepper a tight hug and glared at Tony for a moment before giving him a hug as well.

"Three months," Tony repeated. He glanced at Bruce, who was fidgeting with something in his pocket. Tony was a fairly good guesser, and judging by the lack of bling on Stella's finger, he correctly inferred as to what it was. "And now, I think Bruce has something to say."

Bruce glared at him. "Now's not the time, Tony."

"Oh, yes it is," Tony snapped, clapping Bruce on the shoulder. "You've had that thing in your pocket for two days."

"What?" Stella asked, leaning against the Cadillac.

Bruce drew the tiny box out of his pocket, his long fingers wrapped securely, tightly around it. He opened his hand and flicked the lid open with the belly of his thumb. Inside of the tiny, black velvet box, a ring was nestled securely. It wasn't extravagant; it was simple and pretty. A tiny diamond was set into the thin gold band, and it sparkled prettily in the light.

"It's not much," he began, smiling at Stella's wide grin. "But it's yours, along with my heart."

He slipped the band onto her finger, and she threw her arms around his neck. For once in her life, she was speechless.

"Three months," Tony reminded. And he actually opened the car door for them.

A/N: It's over, it's finished. Thanks for sticking with me of most of the course of this year. It's time to look to the future, though, and it looks productive. I've got three other projects that I'm working on, and that I've been working on over the course of this story, and one I'm planning. Some of you may be interested in the Tony/Bruce story that I'm planning, but as I understand it, most people are more into Stony rather than Brony. But either way, I hope you all enjoyed this story, all twenty-six chapters of it.

And so we go!