A/N: Wow, this one took me a while to write. It's over 4500 words, so I guess that's part of it, but also having to write so much description always slows me down, plus I've been working out some nitty gritty for all of these scenes. It's quite complex but hopefully won't come across as too confusing as you read it.

Now, before we get into it, just to answer one of my guest reviewers who asked if I was planning on any more stories after this... well, I'm not sure. I'm tossing up whether to do a separate story with all the epilogues for these s/l's or to just add them into this story. I've also got an Avenger's Halloween story kicking around in my head which might be a bit of fun but again, I'm not sure I'll have this story done by then. So, in answer to your question – I don't know. There, helpful, wasn't it? LOL

Anyways, I've kept you waiting long enough for this chapter, so here it is. The tension is hopefully building as we go along and I'm not even going to guess how many more chapters there are to go to get us through this – I simply have no idea.

Hope you enjoy and thank you all again for your amazing reviews, I just wish there were enough minutes in the day to answer them all right away. :D

Chapter Sixty-Three

Bruce was slowly regaining control of his body as his hands were cuffed behind him by the two Ghost goons who'd dragged him away. It was too late to do anything to stop them by then, but that didn't stop Bruce from struggling against the handcuffs. They were standing at the back entrance of the laboratory and both men took an arm each of his and dragged him forward.

The man on his left spoke into his comlink. "The package is acquired, ready for pick up."

"Where are you taking me?" Bruce growled, struggling against them but being outmanned by the two guards. He could feel the anger and rage bubbling up inside of him but instead of the Hulk bursting forth, it was like this thick wall between them. A part of Bruce could still hear the creature roaring in his head, but it was unable to break through the prison the nano-bots had created for it. The irony didn't escape Bruce that for all those years he'd been looking to find a way to cage the Hulk and now it was happening at the worst possible time. The two men didn't answer his question but off in the distance Bruce could hear the familiar sound of chopper blades approaching. He struggled harder, trying to free himself even as the beast inside struggled for its own freedom, both to no avail. Bruce roared in frustrated anger and there was the echo of the Hulk doing the same inside his head, but that's all it was, an echo. His stomach tightened as the possibility of his worst fear drew closer that the creature inside of him was going to be used as a weapon of mass destruction and there was nothing Bruce could do to stop it.

oooOOOOooo

"Where are you?"

Tony's urgent question was in Natasha's ear.

"Are you at the nuclear vault?"

Natasha looked around. "Yes."

"Can you see the launch pad?"

Natasha was scanning the complicated series of monitors and control boards in front of her, the ones that were in a little room attached to the vault. "I'm looking."

"Hurry up," Tony urged her. "This thing with the military is looking to get real any minute now."

"I'm aware of that," said Natasha, not breaking in her methodical search of the system lay out. "Don't rush the miracle worker, you'll get a lousy miracle."

"Speaking of miracles, why is it that you're not a mindless automaton again?"

Natasha's lips thinned, not wanting to answer Tony. She'd felt the nano-bots invade her body along with the others but unlike the others, they'd seemed unable to take control of her. Natasha had instantly suspected it was her brain tumour which was preventing the nano-bots seizing control of her brain entirely but wasn't prepared to share that with Tony right then. The why wasn't important, it was the what she was going to do with her free will which was. The irony of the situation was almost poetic in nature. The very thing which was threatening to kill her was turning out to be the thing which could save her. Natasha glanced back at the nuclear stockpile behind her, at least in the short term. A brain tumour was going to be the least of her worries if Ghost was allowed to launch these nuclear weapons. "It didn't take over Bruce," she hedged.

"I'm pretty sure that was because those nano-bots were already designed to seek out his gamma altered DNA in the first place," Tony countered. "They were always going to react differently to Bruce because Ghost wanted them to. She's got bigger plans for our big guy and they're not pretty. You're the wild card though, Romanoff, you not being able to be controlled by the nano-bots is something Ghost wouldn't be planning on at all."

"And that's something we're going to use to our advantage," Natasha said calmly, hoping to distract the dogged Tony. "I've found the launch console." She instantly dropped to her knees and looked under the console. "I can see how to disconnect it."

"Do it," Tony ordered her. "That's one less thing we have to worry about."

Natasha quickly pried open the casing around the delicate electronics and pulled out wires and fuses. There was no need to be subtle because it wasn't going to accidentally launch the nuclear weapons if she pulled the wrong one. She felt something splatter on the ground as she worked, hunched under the console. Natasha looked down to see a few spots of blood on the floor and immediately put a hand to her nose. She wiped away fresh blood which was dripping for her nose and grimaced. The nano-bots may not have been able to take control of her, but they clearly weren't doing her body the world of good. Natasha wiped at her nose again, not having time to worry about that right then. She needed to make sure no launch codes were ever going to get those missiles sky borne and then she was going to get to work saving the Avengers.

Whatever it took because at this point, it looked like she had nothing to lose.

oooOOOOooo

"I can't believe I lost the toss," said Happy from behind blue lips. He was kneeling on the trolley they used to move suitcases around and shaking uncontrollably. The trolley had a low, flat base with wheels like a shopping cart and a backboard with handles for steering. The reason for his current shaking was the fact he had bags of ice poured all over him and stacked up against him. Happy could feel the ice cubes slowly melting against him as they were shoved down his pants and shirt and gave a shudder as icy water trickled into nooks and crannies.

"We don't have time to make it best of three," Lewis argued as he dumped the last of his bags of ice into a spare towel he had in his trunk, twisted it over and then started to tie it to Happy's head. "We're just lucky I had all of this ice in the car."

"Is that really necessary?" asked Happy, already feeling like he was frozen all the way through.

"You lose a lot of heat through your head," Lewis countered as he made sure the ice-filled towel was securely on Happy's head. "We don't want those heat sensors picking up any heat signatures from you at all, otherwise the consequences could be messy."

Happy blinked, starting to feel out of it. "I'm getting brain freeze."

"You just have to hold it together for long enough for me to shunt you over to the control box and you can pull the fuse." Lewis was wheeling him over to a wall which lined up directly with the fuse box while making sure to keep out of the way of the deadly lasers. "The detectors shouldn't be able to pick up you're coming and to make sure, I'll distract them." Lewis reversed over to where there was a large water pipe running against the wall. He sat on it, back against the wall and rested his feet against the backboard of the trolley, ready to push Happy as hard as he could across the space between them and the fuse box. "We've got to hurry, before the ice melts." Lewis braced himself, settling himself into a good position and ready to put as much force as he could into launching Happy across the garage. "Are you ready?"

"Let's do this thing," chattered Happy. "I'm not going to get any colder. My testicles are already lodged in the back of my throat as it is."

Lewis couldn't help but smile as he tensed up, ready to push. "Okay, here we go, three, two-"

"Wait!" said Happy suddenly.

Lewis hesitated. "What?"

He looked back round at him. "Just in case this goes horribly wrong, can you make up something cool for me to have said?" asked Happy anxiously. "I don't want my last words in this world to have testicles in them."

"You got it, buddy," Lewis promised him. "I'll think of something noble with little to no references to balls, except for maybe the size of them."

Happy looked back towards the fuse box and grimaced. "No, don't do that, because at the moment they're the size of currants."

"It's called poetic licence," Lewis reassured him. "Are you ready now?"

"As ready as anyone ever is for almost certain death," said Happy resolutely.

"This is going to work."

"It better, you still owe me money from our last poker night."

"I'm good for it."

"Says the guy about to push me in front of lasers of death," said Happy dryly.

"It's fifty bucks, Hogan," Lewis chided him as he settled himself more securely in position. "My normal rule is to only kill for amounts of one hundred dollars and over."

"Good to know for future reference." Happy hunkered himself down. "Okay, I'm ready, let's get our crazy on."

Lewis drew back his legs and braced himself against the wall, knowing that the aiming of Happy on the trolley was going to be critical. "Three, two, one!" His legs shot out and connected with the back of the trolley as hard as he could. The trolley with its freezing cargo sailed across the garage, directly into the line of fire of the lasers.

Happy flinched, waiting to see if the lasers were going to pick up his heat signature regardless but mercifully the plan actually worked. Lewis's push had him slowing to a roll directly in front of the fuse box, about two feet from where he needed to be. "Damn, close but no cigar," he muttered.

"I'll give the lasers something to focus on," Lewis called out to him. "You'll have to wheel yourself the rest of the way."

"Don't get dead," Happy admonished him. "I want my fifty bucks." He glanced over his shoulder and saw Lewis making a dash across the garage, carefully avoiding the parked cars so the lasers wouldn't hit them and managing to run from pillar to pillar, narrowly avoiding the barrage of fire. Happy quickly put a foot on the ground and wheeled himself to the fuse box. He knew standing up was going to be dangerous because he was going to start regaining body heat very fast. Happy quickly stood up, grabbing the tyre iron by his side as he did. He opened the control box and, taking no chances, he simply smashed the whole system into a mass of broken metal and tangled wires with a series of violent blows with the tyre iron. The whole time Happy knew he was heating up and was bracing himself for the lasers to seek him out but instead, they abruptly stopped firing as his last blow did the trick. He turned around to see Lewis peek his head out from behind a concrete pillar. Happy's arms shot up over his head in triumph. "Not dead!" he declared excitedly. "Still freezing my ass off, but not dead!"

Lewis looked at the mangled control box. "Subtle," he noted in wry amusement.

Happy was unapologetic as he shook ice from his shirt. "What about me, when you look at me screams 'finesse'?" he asked mockingly. "The lasers are down, that's all that matters."

Lewis was already running towards the internal stairs. "You've got that right," he said over his shoulder. "We need to get to that arc reactor and then we need to get to Pepper."

Happy was hopping after him, trying to dislodge the ice from his pants at the same time. "I'm right behind you."

oooOOOOooo

Pepper ignored the pain in her knees as she crawled over the uneven floor of the air conditioning ducting. The space was small and cramped and Pepper was glad she didn't suffer from any kind of claustrophobia but even if she had, she knew she'd be doing this. There was no way she was going to leave Tony and the other Avengers under the control of those nano-bots and she'd have crawled over broken glass if she'd had to if it was the only way to free them. Pepper knew Tony must be going crazy right now, not being able to control his own suit and she knew how terrified he'd always been of his technology falling into the wrong hands. Pepper knew he'd be doing everything in his power to stop this but right now, Tony simply didn't have any power but she did and she was going to use it all for him.

"You have a really nice ass," Hammer commented casually from behind her as they crawled along. "I've always thought so, nice and firm. What is that, Pilates, Tae Bo, Zumba? No matter what I do, I always end up with a bit of junk in my trunk."

Pepper didn't think, she just kicked out behind her with her right leg and felt her foot connect with Hammer's face. It was such a shame she'd had to take her shoes off because Hammer getting a stiletto in the face was the only thing that would have made the moment better.

"OW!" screeched Hammer in pain. "Uncool, Potts!"

Pepper ignored him and just kept moving. Hammer wasn't worth slowing down for.

"You know, I'm not having a great day either," he complained behind her.

"You're the one who started all of this!" Pepper snapped at him angrily. "I can't believe you want me to feel sorry for you when it was your twisted need for revenge that got us all here." She stopped moving for a second and looked back over her shoulder, blue eyes full of steely reserve. "And if Tony ends up hurt or worse out of this, you're going to wish you had been killed in an implosion," she ground out.

"Come on," he chided her, "death threats from Pepper Potts, is that really meant to scare me?"

Pepper's face hardened. "You don't know me, Hammer, you don't know what I'm capable of doing and what I'll do to protect the people I love." She kept crawling, not bothering to wait for an answer. She couldn't think about losing Tony, the notion was inconceivable as angry tears pricked her eyes. It had taken so long for her and Tony to finally be together, a life without him was not to be considered. Pepper didn't care what it took, Tony wasn't going to die today, not while there was still breath in her body. Up ahead Pepper could see another opening in the ducting ahead and if her calculations where right, it would open up in the ceiling above the corridor to the internal fire escape stairwell. "We're almost there," she said tightly, "keep up and you'd better have a way of stopping that reactor."

"And if I don't?" Hammer challenged her.

"My plan B is to throw you into it and see if that does any good," said Pepper coldly.

"Ha ha, very funny."

"Do you hear me laughing, Hammer?" she said grimly.

oooOOOOooo

Natasha straightened up from underneath the console. "It's done, Stark. The launch console can't be used now."

"Good," said Tony, "because hell is about to break loose up here."

Natasha was already running back down the corridor, towards the roof. "I'm on my way."

"There is nothing you can do," Tony said quickly. "Stay where you are."

Natasha ignored him and kept running. "Ghost isn't there, is she?"

"No."

"If she's not there and the fighting is about to start, she must know she doesn't have to tell the nano-bots what to do. My best guess is the nano-bots are programmed to attack anyone who attacks them."

"A solid hypothesis."

Natasha was running up the stairs to the roof now. "Then that is what they're going to get," she replied determinedly.

oooOOOOooo

Lewis threw open the door to the arc reactor level and ran into the corridor, Happy behind him, dripping wet, but hot on his heels. They both rushed to the room containing the arc reactor. "We need the code to get in," Lewis noted as they rounded the corner and the both of them came to a dead halt at the sight in front of them. "Then again," he said unevenly, trying to work out what he was seeing.

The metal door to the arc reactor containment room had been basically twisted off its hinges by what looked to be like silver tentacles which were wrapped all around it. The two of them edged closer and looked into the room and it became immediately apparent that those tentacles were just the tip of the iceberg. The huge arc reactor sat in the middle of the room, and stood at least sixty feet high in the large room and almost as wide with its spinning rings and bright, pulsating glow. There was a walkway built all around its impressive girt and another one far above their heads running over the top of it to allow access for any repairs. The thing was though; the arc reactor was no longer alone in its purpose-built cradle. It looked like thousands upon thousands of impossibly fine tendrils of silver line were wrapped all around it, weaving itself in and out of the power source and then stretching out into the surrounding walls. The tendrils embedded themselves into the walls, disappearing from sight as they burrowed into the infrastructure of the building. The arc reactor now looked as though it had been caught in some silver spider web and both Lewis and Happy couldn't stop staring at it.

"I think I see what the problem might be," Happy deadpanned.

Lewis shook his head in disbelief. "How could this have happened?"

"And more importantly, how do we undo this?"

Lewis thought quickly. "Okay, so this web thing is what is helping control the building and power the nano-bots which have taken over the Avengers, right? And it's feeding off the arc reactor. So, our plan remains, take out the arc reactor and then hopefully whatever this is has been neutralised."

"And how do we do that?"

Lewis looked at the pulsating arc and the rapidly moving rings spinning in the middle of it. "How about we throw things into the heart of it and stop those rings from spinning? That's got to do something."

"Why do I suddenly feel like the Ewoks doing battle with the Imperial Walkers, throwing rocks at technology?" asked Happy dryly.

"If memory serves, the Ewoks won that battle," Lewis observed, already starting to hunt around for metal things to throw into the heart of the reactor. He headed over to the far wall, where a fire extinguisher was attached and yanked it from its holder. "This is a good place to start."

"Tony, thank God!"

Happy's relieved voice came from behind him as he turned around to see Tony in his Iron Man suit walk into the room.

Happy was immediately hurrying up to him, pointing to the arc reactor. "Boss, you've got to take it out, hurry!"

Lewis blinked, fire extinguisher in his hand as Iron Man strode towards Happy. He took in the sight, something registering with him and Lewis bolted towards Happy as Iron Man raised his hand, repulsors glowing ready to fire on the trusting Happy. Lewis threw himself at Happy, knocking him out of the way just in time but catching some of the blast on his right shoulder. He rolled them both to safety, ignoring the pain in his arm. "It's the wrong suit," he yelled at the startled Happy as they were both trying to run from the Iron Man suit now. "This is the Mach VII, the one that is meant to be quarantined," he explained, grabbing for the fire axe as they ran by. "I think the suit is working by itself." Lewis turned around and hurled the axe straight at the suit. The blade lodged in its shoulder but all the Iron Man suit did was pull it out, now having another weapon. "Crap," muttered Lewis as he and Happy started running again.

"Is the arc reactor letting the nano-bots control the suit?" Happy quizzed him a little breathlessly as they ducked and weaved fresh repulsor fire.

"I guess," grunted Lewis, manoeuvring around the room, seeing as their exit was blocked by the suit.

"Then the plan remains the same," figured Happy hastily, "destroy the arc reactor and the suit will stop trying to kill us."

"Separate," said Lewis determinedly, "then it'll have two targets."

They ran either side of the walkway around the arc reactor, forcing the Mach VII to make a choice. It chose to hunt down Lewis, concentrating its fire on him.

oooOOOOooo

Out in front of him, Tony could see the military all in order with the Defenders standing in front of them. He closed his eyes, lips tightening. "Fury, we're in deep doo doo here. The army is about to throw down and we're being forced to pick up. Tell them to stand down."

"I've tried," said a frustrated sounding Fury. "All we can do now is back you up."

"Lives are going to be lost," said Tony in agitation. "I didn't put on this suit to kill innocent people."

"None of us did, Stark, and this battle isn't over yet."

"If we can't regain control of ourselves, then you need to be a part of the solution here," Tony warned him.

"Meaning?"

"Meaning you've got a duty of care to take us all out," said Tony tightly, "anyway you can. You know we're a lethal force, Fury, you put us together to be just that. None of us want to be responsible for the deaths of innocent people. I need to know that if it comes down to it, you'll do the right thing and help them neutralise us."

There was a pause on the other end of the link. Eventually Fury spoke. "I'll do my duty to protect the American people, like I've always done."

There was a grim relief in hearing that. "Good, that's the most important thing right now."

Suddenly a voice came over a loud speaker. "Avengers, this is General McAdams. You are ordered by the President of the United States to stand down and give yourselves up. If you do not do this, then we will be forced to take you by whatever means necessary."

"This is insane," said Tony angrily, "none of us have a choice in this."

A confident female voice came from behind him. "One of us does."

Suddenly the ground shook beneath Tony's feet and all of the Avengers turn around to see Natasha had pulled some plastic explosives from her belt and lobbed them at the ground near them. She pulled out her guns and immediately started to fire at Tony and Steve, knowing they had shields to protect themselves. The rest of the Avengers moved as one to stop her.

"Natasha, no!" Tony yelled at her. "We'll kill you!" Even as he said the words, his suit was raising its arm and pointing its repulsors at her.

"You won't be the first to try," as she kept up the attack, throwing more of her plastic explosives at them and keeping up her barrage of bullets, even as she nimbly moved around to avoid each of their attacks, "but it's easier said than done, trust me, Stark." Now that Natasha had their attention, she was bolting for the stairwell, the Avengers hot on her tail.

Tony made a frustrated noise but he was forced to follow her with the others. They're speculation had been right, the nano-bots attacked anyone who attacked them. While it had stalled a confrontation between the military and the Avengers, Tony couldn't help but be filled with dread that he was about to witness the murder of one of the Avengers, possibly by his own hand as they chased Natasha down the stairs. "Run!" he ordered her frantically. "Run, Natasha!"

oooOOOOooo

Hammer followed Pepper down the stairs as they both raced towards the arc reactor. Truth be told, Hammer was grateful to have a bit of time to work out his next move. He just needed to get some traction on this thing again and he was confident he could get back in control of the situation. Hammer really hadn't expected Ghost's betrayal but ultimately he was a survivor and it was what he did best. He knew he was going to find a way out of this, he always did.

"It's through here," Pepper declared as she yanked open the door leading from the stairwell into the floor containing the arc reactor.

Hammer followed her out into the corridor, careful to make sure she went first. There was no telling what Ghost had waiting for them in that arc reactor, but he had a few ideas.

Pepper caught sight of the mangled door to the arc reactor and sent him an unimpressed look over her shoulder. "This would be your handiwork, I presume?"

Hammer was unapologetic. "You could say that."

They were at the doorway to the reactor room now and they both looked inside just in time to see Iron Man standing in front of the arc reactor which was covered in silver tendrils. His hand was raised at the walkway above them and Hammer saw a blonde man he recognised as one of Pepper's body guards, running across the metal bridge. Hammer also noticed Happy coming up from under the walkway Iron Man was standing on, looking like he was launching an attack on the distracted Iron Man.

"Look out, behind you!" called out Hammer, warning what he knew was the nano-bot controlled suit. He had a plan on seeing this scene, he just needed to play his cards right.

The Mach VII reacted instantly, reaching behind itself and grabbing Happy. The suit flipped Happy over its head as though the stocky man weighed nothing, smashing him down into the metal walkway beneath its feet.

"Happy!" screamed Pepper in distress as the other man hit the ground and didn't move.

The Mach VII raised its hand again, aiming its weapons at Pepper as Hammer instantly ducked back out of the doorway, automatically protecting himself. He sneaked his head around the corner when Lewis' voice came above them.

"Hey, up here!" Lewis threw a fire extinguisher at the Mach VII. The extinguisher bounced off it harmlessly but the suit was now firing on the body guard. "Get out of here, Pepper!" Lewis yelled at her while he distracted the suit. "RUN!"

The blasts hit the walkway he was running on and half the walkway gave way. Lewis was thrown against the wall of room and then tumbled down onto the ground below, landing on a pile of debris. Hammer assumed the guy had been killed, but he wasn't hanging around to find out. He took off back down the hall, looking for a temporary safe house and working out his next step.

He wasn't out of this game yet…