Jon settled next to Peggy as she read through another report. "I'm sorry we couldn't get clearance to tell you when it happened...when I was...made."
She sat the tablet down and pulled her son into a hug. She didn't care that it was just a copy of his mind stuck in a younger body, this was her boy too. "Hush."
Jon buried his face in her shoulder and just breathed.
Tony threw down the wrench he'd been about to use as Bruce came into his workshop. He pushed his goggles up onto his forehead and watched Bruce check for Francis before taking a seat.
Bruce clasped his hands together over his stomach. "You okay, Tony?"
"Hmm." Tony flicked his schematics around and squinted at the wire layout. "Okay with what?"
"You didn't exactly plan for the extra people that have more or less invaded."
"It doesn't matter. I've got plenty of room." Tony glanced over at Bruce and frowned. "What's with you? You've got that frowny line in between your eyes. That never bodes well for the floors or the walls...You mad at me, Bruce-y?"
Bruce rolled his eyes and leaned back in his chair. "I don't have frown lines."
"Sure, you didn't smash the crap out of Loki either."
"That wasn't m...Nevermind." Bruce sighed. "Jarod is...extremely odd."
Tony made a face. "And this surprises you how?" Tony cocked his head. "Wait...how odd are we talking?"
"He thinks the other guy is interesting. He was asking questions about mass conversion and how the gamma radiation binds to my blood." Bruce rubbed his hand across his mouth. "He was cheerful the whole time."
"Cheerful equals odd in your world?"
"No. Tony." Bruce stood and paced towards the nearby wall and back to Tony's desk. "Jarod said his full brother, Kyle, died to save him. He was sad for about three seconds and then he told me how much Kyle would have liked to have known about me."
"Ah." Tony stepped in beside Bruce and steered him towards the table for planning projects. "Here, take a look at the upgrade I'm working on for Natasha and tell me if you think she'll rag me for making her weapons."
Bruce watched Tony explode the weapon plans into the component details. "You think she'll tease you for making her a weapon?"
Tony turned the plans and shoved them towards Bruce. "I honestly don't have a clue. Not the point, though."
"Really?"
With a grin, Tony cocked his head and pointed at Bruce with a nearby screwdriver. "Really. You need to quit being scared."
Bruce blinked. "What?" He moved a joint separation over a couple of millimeters so it wouldn't be right on the knob of wrist bone when Natasha wore it. "I'm not scared."
"Yes, you are." Tony peered at the change and nodded, making the mirror change to the other wrist's plan. "You are scared shitless because he's not only your brother, but he doesn't despise you for anything."
"I don't think Jarod could despise someone."
Tony gave him an exasperated look. "Ask him about the Centre and then stand back and you'll see despise up close and personal."
"You talked to him?" Bruce turned the plan over and started checking the way the band would sit on the body.
"We talked about the rest of your shared family. There's a clone of him, you remember Clint saying something about that, right? Well, it turns out he's about the age of Jon now. They should get along. The younger one is getting called Jay, which is just stupid." Tony made a face at Bruce's raised eyebrows. "It's a lot of J names. That's all I'm saying. Lots. Do you know that the clone was being raised by an evil old geezer with a horrible smoking habit?"
Bruce wrinkled his nose at the sudden mental image of a balding man with a oxygen tank and a cigarette. "What does that have to do with...Nevermind." Bruce flicked the plan to Tony. "You're to the point of needing Natasha to try them."
"Yeah." Tony turned away from the table. "JARVIS, save the plans and close it down."
"The plans have been saved to your private sever, sir. Also, Miss Potts has asked me to remind you that the Congressional meeting on Dr. Banner's status in relation to the Army is tomorrow."
Tony clapped his hands together. "Right, totally forgot about that." He looked at Bruce. "You can't come." Tony flapped his hand at Bruce as he walked towards the door. "They would arrest you before we could get anything decided and then there'd be bad press when the rest of the team and I defied them and broke you out."
"Tony."
"Not to mention that I think they'd probably try to strip me of the Iron Man suit if I were to put it on in Congress and blast...Well, no, given the current approval ratings I might get a medal..."
"Tony."
Tony turned and blinked at Bruce. "What?"
"I don't want to go anyway."
Tony frowned. "Oh." He pressed the call button for the elevator. "Why not?"
"They're going to decide to give me to the Army, Tony. I might as well enjoy the last days I have free here with Betty and everyone in the Tower."
Tony's expression hardened. "Right." He strode into the elevator and turned with his for the press grin firmly in place. "We'll just have to see about that."
Coulson frowned and passed the pile of papers to Pepper. "I don't think we are going to win this one."
"Well, not having you for counter petitions just after the battle did gum things up some." Pepper adjusted her seat as Francis climbed up into her lap. "And, hello, to you too, Francis."
"Are we going to give Bruce to the Army? He thinks we are and we shouldn't. He belongs here."
Phil frowned slightly. "Francis, where did you hear that?"
Francis shrugged and ducked his head. "Uhm..."
Pepper brushed his hair of his forehead. "Nevermind that, Francis." She looked at Phil over Francis' head. "We're working on getting Bruce cleared of some charges that the Army have against him because of the Hulk."
Phil looked Francis in the eye. "The Army thinks they own the Hulk, which means Bruce as well."
Francis frowned and slid down from Pepper's lap. "This Congressional, they decide who gets Bruce?"
Phil nodded. "The Congressional meeting will decide the issue, yes."
"Okay." Francis nodded and ran out of the room.
Pepper watched him go. "That didn't sound ominous at all."
Jon stared at the little grim faces staring back up at him. "And what do you think I can do?"
Hanna climbed up beside him on the couch. "You're old enough to have an idea about how to convince the Congressional people that Bruce should stay here."
"Congress, just say Congress." Jon looked at Francis, who was staring back at him. "Are they just deciding whether to order the Army to dismiss the charges against him, or are they making a recommendation on Bruce's custody?"
"Personhood status, custody, and charges." Francis scrambled up beside Hanna. "That's all I got read of the papers Phil and Pepper were filling out."
Jon rubbed his cheek. "Well, alright. Do we know how many people the Hulk has killed?"
"Unprovoked or when provoked, Jon?"
They all started and glanced up at the ceiling.
"You have stats, JARVIS?"
"Indeed. Would you like them ranked by severity or probability they were the direct result of upsetting the Hulk?"
Jon grinned. "Okay. Let's start with the direct results list."
Natasha settled across the table from Jarod. "You seem calm about all of this."
Jarod smiled at her. "I have more living family. I'm extremely happy." He cocked his head. "I will do my best to not hurt anyone here. I know how much Barton means to you."
With a nod, Natasha leaned back a minute amount in her chair."You aren't in very many of the videos we got from the Centre when we took it apart to get Clint back."
"No, I wouldn't be." Jarod touched the table between them and pulled up the list of footage they had. "You got the main server, but not before I did." He took a thumbnail drive out of his pocket. "I stole money and data from the Centre shortly after I escaped. I'd been planning a while by then. I even tried to get out some of the others." He sat the drive down on the interface plate. "Stark's IA can pull the data off of this."
They waited while JARVIS uploaded and slotted the new data files in with the rest.
Natasha stared at the screen. "Is there anyone that was nice to you?"
"The man that usually had control over me, Sydney. He was nice to me."
She nodded. "Clint didn't have that."
"Neither did my brother, Kyle. He was trained by Raines and wasn't completely sane as an adult."
Natasha pulled up a new file and they watched a young Jarod talk about snowflakes to a dark haired girl. "Who's the little girl?"
"That's Miss Parker. She's...They ordered her to chase me after I escaped." He smiled softly. "She shot at me."
Natasha got up and moved to the tea pot. "She wasn't amongst the adults we rounded up."
Jarod nodded and closed the video file. "Neither was Sydney or Mr. Broots from the list Stark gave me to look over."
"You've seen video of what Bruce does that makes him an Avenger?" She sat a cup in front of each of them as she sat back down.
Jarod pulled up a different video file. "Hanna wanted me to see the neat thing she said he could do. So..." He smiled widely. "Yes, it is very neat."
"You are crazy." Natasha put her chin in her hands. "The Hulk is anything but neat."
"It just depends on how you look at it." Jarod opened a shaky amateur video of the Hulk punching the large flying monster-thing. "Most people see something to fear when he does this. I see someone protecting himself. Bruce was dosed with enough gamma to kill him several times over. Instead he got an ability that's taken him some time to control. To learn how to use it to protect others."
She blinked at the file as the Hulk punched another invader. "He's better at control than when he started out."
"Of course he is. Give him some practice time were the Hulk isn't required to run away from being shot at and see what he can really do."
She smiled with one corner of her mouth. "Thank you, Dr. Gerber."
"Are you done getting a soundbite for the Congressional meeting I'm supposed to not attend tomorrow?"
She grinned. "You knew."
He shrugged. "You are very good, if that helps."
"You believed what you were saying about Bruce?"
"Yes." Jarod nodded at her. "You did about what you were saying, didn't you?"
"He got hunted like a rabid dog just after his accident." She took a sip of her tea. "He didn't have time to learn anything useful about his condition."
"And if General Ross had not feared him so much, do you think that the invasion would have been stopped as it was?"
She blinked. "Bruce would be..."
"I would be what?" Bruce pushed his glasses back up on his nose as Natasha stood up from the table.
"Nothing." Natasha gave him a quick hug and left with Bruce staring after her.
Bruce turned to Jarod. "Do you know what just happened?"
"Not really." Jarod got up to help Bruce make dinner. "Has Stark decided where he's taking everyone to go dancing tomorrow night?"
"I didn't pay attention. I'm probably going to be busy anyway."
Jarod smiled at Hanna peeking at them from around the doorjamb. "We'll just have to see how busy you end up being. I'm sure Hanna wants to learn to dance."
She smiled back and disappeared out of the kitchen.
