Chapter 12.

Steve lay in his hospital bed, turning pages in a novel without reading anything. Someone would be worried if they saw him sitting there, pensive, doing nothing. He had given up on trying to make himself useful. He felt like a moron when Tony, Bruce, and Bloom discussed the science behind the gas, and he was too tired to do much of anything outside of this room. Bloom worried his age was catching up to him. Tony kept saying he was pouting.

But despite his slow withdrawal, Steve was taking it the best.

Thor was pacing, his long golden hair almost white now. He had lost his powers, his glow, but he was still quite strong. He had been sedated multiple times, occasionally going off the rails.

"I cannot take this anymore," Thor said, pausing to glare out the window at the researchers flitting about. "It has been four days, with so little progress. I cannot live like this."

He was grieving. Steve had heard the stories of his arrival on this planet, the loss of his hammer, how profoundly it affected him. He never thought he might witness it firsthand.

Thor grabbed a clipboard and hurled it at the wall.

A dozen faces turned toward them, startled, unwilling to engage. Steve felt like a lab rat, sitting in here all day, the subject of all of their studies.

Bruce jumped at the sudden sound.

He was the opposite of Thor, barely speaking, not eating. He was so focused on studying the gas that he had earned an IV in his arm. He was even more nervous than usual, more on edge, perched on a fence between insanity and revelation.

His condition was the most troubling to the researchers, and of the most interest. Bloom occasionally mentioned how remarkable it was that Bruce was still alive, given the Hulk had originally saved him from the burst of Gamma radiation. Tony seemed troubled, often hovering at the window, squinting, deep in thought. Steve had a feeling the scientists were keeping some things to themselves.

Early in the afternoon, Thor finally lost his patience. "I am going to retrieve my hammer."

Steve put his book down. "I'm not sure that's a great idea right now."

"I will not sit here like a prisoner." He grabbed one of the IV stands and whacked the observation window with it, making an awful clanging sound, "Open the door, or I shall shatter this window!"

A doctor approached, "I'm sorry, we were instructed not to open the door."

Thor banged on the window with his palm, making the whole thing quake. Even without his godly powers, he was a force of nature. "No, you do not understand. I cannot be powerless. Not again. I will take up Mjolnir and this nightmare will end. You will see."

His voice broke. He choked on those words.

Steve joined him at the window, "Open the door."

With a glance over his shoulder, probably to make sure Natasha wasn't around, the doctor unlocked the door. "I'm sorry," he repeated, genuinely.

He was talking about more than just the locked door.

Steve nodded, grateful, and followed Thor to the elevator.

Bruce joined them, wringing his hands. "I'm coming, too."

Thor only gave it a split second of thought. "We are all on the same ship, I suppose."

"Same boat," Bruce said.

Thor waved the correction away. "We will retrieve my hammer, and then make merry."

It was freezing out. Steve was bundled in a winter jacket, thick pants, and a toboggan, but the cold bit straight through him. Even when he was younger, born and raised in Brooklyn, he never handled the winter well. He was too small to fight it. The cold air hit his bones. Bucky used to give him extra jackets, socks, and hats when he outgrew them, going as far as putting them in the closet himself when Steve turned him down.

Thor was already in better spirits when they made it to the garage, located below the tower. He slid into the Viper, Tony's favorite car, and revved the engine in neutral.

"Do you know how to drive?" Bruce wondered.

Thor shrugged, toying with the gearshift. "I have seen it in many films."

"Okay, no, let me drive, please," Bruce took over, spending way too long adjusting his mirrors. He slid his hands down the steering wheel, whistling. "God, this is a nice car."

Thor snorted, "You have clearly seen very few vessels. We saw more impressive ships on Anda, when we went to see Fa – isn't that right, Steve?"

"How is he, by the way?" Steve wondered.

"I have heard he is thriving."

The veterans outreach center was still taped up from the incident, cold and silent.

Steve hated to see it like this. Sam had spent so much time getting it funded, designing it, arranging outings to it from the local senior homes. He knew a lot of the veterans himself. Steve had also put a lot of work into this place, a lot of hope. He had lost decades in the ice, and Sam was far younger than most of the people the place was built for, but surviving a war glued them all together.

When he wasn't patrolling or sleeping, Sam was up in the tower with Steve. He left the place in ruins, in disrepair, and thought of nothing but the team.

Thor shoved through the barriers. What made him Thor was in his head, not his hammer. Steve felt the same way about himself – only without his strength, his desire to help others was unactionable. He was in limbo, just like he was before he joined the army.

Mjolnir was sitting there, upright, in a small crater.

Thor strode up to it, grasped the handle, and fell to his knees as the hammer resisted. He seemed to know that this would happen. Steve saw the grief on his face before he had given it half a try. It budged, wiggled once or twice, and then went still. Thor rested his head on the handle, like someone saying goodbye to a dying loved one. He shut his eyes.

Steve gave him a few minutes, standing silently, respectfully, and then he crouched beside him. "I'm sorry," he said.

Thor tipped his head back to look at Steve, "I am… lost. I do not understand. When I lost Mjolnir before, it was not like this. I did not feel this way." Thor grasped a lock of his hair, now entirely white. "What is happening to me?"

Steve said, "We'll figure this out. We have the best minds on it."

Thor gave Bruce a sharp look, "The best minds did this to us."

Bruce flinched. "I'm so sorry. I'm going to fix this. I swear."

"I will hold you to that, Banner."

"We should go," Steve said softly. "We'll freeze if we stay out here much longer."

Thor shook himself, giving Mjolnir one last, longing look before pulling himself up. "I do not wish to go back to the tower yet. Come and have a drink with me, my friends."

Bruce said, "That seems like a bad idea… but honestly, I really, really want a beer."

Steve nearly tried to talk them out of it, but after spending four days in that tower with no answers, wallowing in his thoughts and the pity of everyone around him, it was nice to be outside. It was nice to be away from it all, with two people who understood the situation intimately.

Bruce led them to a bar a couple of blocks away. On the way, he said, "Sometimes I wander around the city at night. Insomniac. I've found all kinds of cool places."

It was a hole-in-the-wall joint, warm and cozy inside, with memorabilia crowding the walls and soft country-rock playing over the speakers. They sat in a corner booth in the back.

"How quickly we go from celebratory drinks to solemn ones," Thor said, taking up his beer and downing half of it. He held his glass up, "To having our destinies snatched from us."

Bruce tapped his glass to Thor's, taking a long swig, wincing as he swallowed it.

Steve took a drink, though alcohol had never really been his style. Even before the serum made him incapable of getting drunk, he never bothered. He was unhealthy enough as it was – and he had seen what alcohol did to people. Drunk men would lie in the snow by the road, tattered clothes, blackened feet, grinning like everything was alright. Once, he asked his mother about the other parts of their family, where his grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins were, and all she had to say about her siblings was that they were drunks. Not one spare detail.

But now seemed like a time to be like those men lying in the street, to be blissfully unaware of what was wrong with the world. Steve was not smart like Bruce and Tony, or an elite spy like Clint and Natasha. He was half of himself, maybe less, without his enhancements.

He gave a toast, "To being normal," and finished his drink.

A few beers in, Bruce – the reasonable one – ordered food to help taper the effects of the alcohol. Steve was feeling fuzzy, more enthusiastic, less burdened. He dug into cheese fries, listening to stories Bruce told about his college days. He had lived a remarkable life, even before becoming the Hulk. He seemed content to think about his past.

Thor had an arm around Steve, laughing, "You are my favorite, do you know that? You have become so small that I might fit you in my pocket."

Bruce passed Steve a warm bite of cheesy bread, the last of it. "Eat this. You look like you're about to pass out."

Steve nibbled at it. "I'm fine."

Thor said, "Even if I never hold my hammer again, I might die happy knowing I was among good friends." He flagged down the waitress, wiggling his empty glass, "Another, please."

Bruce was pushing crumbs around on his little appetizer plate, his mood slowly slipping. Steve said, "Why did you do it?"

Bruce looked at him through hooded eyes. He was exhausted. "You know why."

"I know why," Steve repeated, sorting out thoughts in his fuzzy mind. "But why hide it?"

Bruce was quiet for several minutes, contemplating, dropping his eyes to draw little circles in the table. When he finally spoke, his voice was low, afraid. "Lately it's been worse. When the Hulk takes over, I'm not just in the passenger's seat with one hand on the wheel – I'm not even in the car. Sometimes I can't remember where we've been or what we've done. It's starting to feel like, instead than sharing a body with him, I'm just constantly fighting to stay in control. Honestly, it… it terrifies me."

He shuddered, finished his beer, and said,

"I'm worried that one day I might never come back."

Steve forgot whatever harsh thing he was going to say about Bruce taking his blood when he was in the hospital. It didn't seem to matter anymore. He said, "I'm sorry."

"You…" Bruce laughed a little, frowned, took a sip of his beer. "You can't say that to me. I have so much more to be sorry for."

"I mean that I'm sorry that you have to deal with that," Steve said, sliding his beer away and sipping a glass of water. "How does it feel now that the Hulk is gone?"

"I'm still deciding."

"I will forgive you," Thor said, almost in a shout, clapping a hand down hard on Bruce, "But right now, I am very cross with you, as I was with Loki when we were children. He dug a pit and lured me into it. I was down there for two days before Mother noticed."

Steve and Bruce exchanged a concerned glance.

"Childhood antics," Thor added, chuckling.

A man approached the table, taller than Steve, big beer-belly – and scowling. "Hey, can you guys stop sharing your feelings long enough for us to enjoy the game? I'm trying to relax over here."

Thor rose immediately, like he had been waiting for this to happen. Maybe he was being loud on purpose, hoping to start a fight, hoping to do something stupid. "Who are you, to raise your voice to me?"

"Thor, chill," Bruce said under his breath.

Steve got up, hoping to step between them, but finding no room. Thor had puffed his chest up like an angry gorilla, and the other guy had not budged. Steve said, "I'm sorry about my friend," and to Thor, "Maybe we should head home."

Thor smiled. "No, no, I handle my disputes, powers or not. If you are so concerned with my voice, try to make me shut up."

"Oh, no," Bruce groaned.

"You better listen to your friend," the angry guy said.

Steve leaned on the table when the room heaved sideways. "Thor, it's not worth it."

Thor said, "I will squash this tiny man, and then we can go," – and got punched in the mouth. While the patron returned to his buddies in triumph, and Thor lay on the ground groaning, Steve threw up on the table.

Bruce rested his head in his hands.

An hour later they were back in the hospital room.

Thor had a concussion, Steve had an IV in his arm, and Bruce had fallen asleep with a towel over his face, saying he had a migraine.

And Natasha beheld them all, hands on her hips.

"In our defense," Steve said, "That guy was a jerk."

She almost smiled. Almost. "You three are like children. I didn't think I'd have to lock you in the tower, but here we are."

"We were already locked in," Thor said. "No human bonds can hold me." And then he scrunched up his face, massaging his temple. "Ow."

Natasha laughed. "I'm not sure you would get very far right now. You all look terrible. I think you should just lay here and try not to put yourselves in mortal danger – at least for today."

"I would hardly call it mortal danger," Thor scoffed.

"It was pretty tame," Steve agreed. "I've had way worse ass kickings."

"And we were among friends," Thor added.

Steve nodded along.

Natasha rolled her eyes, giving a dismissive, "Boys," before she left the room.

XxXxX

It was late. Bruce was unsure of the time. He was hungover, a little woozy, and the windows beyond the hospital floor were dark. A few researchers milled around the common area, checking monitors, typing reports, but the place was a ghost town. Steve was asleep, turned away, and Thor was staring at the ceiling. His jolly attitude had faded.

Bruce had slept little these past four days, so focused on fixing his mistakes that he let his health decline. Without the hulk there to prop him up, he was sliding down a steep hill.

But there was still work to be done.

He dragged himself out of bed, staggering, and tapped on the window. Gregory Bloom was among those still working, and he was the one to answer the summons.

He opened the door. "I'm under strict orders to keep you three in there."

Bruce smiled. "I think we're done with field trips for the day. I can be more useful out there."

Dr. Bloom stepped aside to let him out, locking the door back. It was a useless gesture, because the others weren't going anywhere tonight.

Bruce joined him at one of the nearby computers, where molecular models of the gas were presented in a grid on screen. "Did you make these?" Bruce asked.

Bloom nodded, rubbing his eyes and leaning heavily on his elbows. "I've been creating potential models all day. If I could just nail down the structure, I could work on breaking it down."

Bruce looked over the images. His head was clouded. He doubted he could actually be useful out here, either. "I never imagined my work with Dr. Freeman could result in something so… sophisticated. I had no idea he was making this – if this was him, that is."

"You still think he might be innocent?"

"I think… I don't know." Bruce was avoiding those thoughts. It was useless to obsess over it, when Freeman was in the wind and the mercenaries were not talking. Right now, the only workable angle they had was the gas. "I know, logically, that he might be the only person who could make this, but I also really, really hope that this is all some big misunderstanding."

Bloom twisted his lips in silent judgement.

"I know." Bruce groaned. "He's my friend. I owe him the benefit of the doubt."

Bloom was about to respond, but one of the other machines beeped.

"I have the molecules under constant duress," Bloom said as he hopped off of his stool. He looked through a microscope, onto a slide on which several very small instruments were moving around. "Tony and I built this. He called it the 'gasser-harasser.'"

"We gotta stop letting him name stuff," Bruce grumbled. He got down to eye-level with the specimen slide, fascinated by the movement inside. Each tool got smaller and smaller, until the end of the probe was nearly invisible to the naked eye. "How did he make this?"

Bloom was watching through the lens. "I'm not sure how Tony makes half of this equipment." He smiled, "Look at that. Come here."

Bruce put his eyes to the lenses – and gasped. And smiled. "What…?"

He was looking at what appeared to be cells. Little molecules with membranes and dark blotches inside, like organelles. Even with a microscope this powerful, it was still too small to differentiate the anatomy. But it was unmistakably alive, wriggling around as the gasser-harasser poked at it.

"It's alien," Bruce said, taking the reins, trying to focus the microscope. "It looks like your harasser dissipated some of the other components and just left this. Wait here. I think I have a compound that can make this more visible."

Bruce retrieved a rarely-used compound from one of the downstairs labs. He developed it after the alien attack on New York, intending to combat any residual effects from the technology that lay scattered in their city. Its effects were limited, as were its current uses. He applied it to the slide, watching through the microscope as the landscape changed.

The alien cell shrunk away from the compound, and then lysed, its anatomy suddenly very clear. Bloom took the other eyepiece, sketching it with one hand.

Bloom was practically bouncing. "I think I know what I have to do. I'll need to make more models. Do you want some coffee?"

Bruce stepped away, head aching. "No, I think I should get some sleep. Maybe doing one useful thing will net me a few hours."

"You had the best intentions," Bloom said suddenly, as Bruce was going back into his prison. "I can't count the things I've designed that have been used to hurt people. It's the nature of what we do. We have curiosity, ingenuity, and others have… ambition. I think Tony and I understand it the most. You should stop beating yourself up."

Bruce hesitated to take that advice, but Bloom seemed genuine. "Thanks."