Chapter 23 - Ninety-Nine Bottles

After Steve had whisked Sif away to an examination room, Tony had pushed Leonard onto the elevator and taken him up to the penthouse. Pepper had joined them about twenty minutes later. "So let me get this straight," said Leonard, staring into the whiskey Tony had poured for him, which he still hadn't touched. "You've had suspicions about Karla Sofen for two months, but you didn't say anything until now."

Tony had finished his own glass and now paced in front of the penthouse window. "We wanted to get more evidence first, so Pep made an appointment with her, but she was all booked up until January. Even being CEO of Stark industries and my fiancée didn't help—"

Pepper put her hand on his knee. "We're so sorry, Leonard. We should have just talked to you."

"Yes, you should have! To be honest, I thought it was a little suspicious when she started him on those experimental drugs, but I told myself I was being paranoid. No, come to think of it, maybe Karla told me I was being paranoid—oh my God." Leonard realized that he had no right to be angry with Tony when he was the one that should have known something was wrong. What kind of psychiatrist was he, anyway? "Tony, I think I should step down as the Avenger's staff psychiatrist. The truth is, I'm a complete fraud."

Tony stopped pacing. "You do have a medical degree and training in psychiatry, right?"

"Yes, but when I first came here, I misrepresented myself. I'm actually horrible at my job. Have you ever read my Yelp reviews?"

"Yelp reviews don't mean anything, Doc."

"Karla has a five-star rating on Yelp."

"Because she gaslights her patients and makes them completely dependent on her," Pepper reminded him. "She's even gotten some of them to write her into their wills."

Tony collapsed into the chair across from him. "If it helps, I kind of thought you might be overselling yourself a little at first. But you try, and you've made a lot of headway with Loki. He's the one we hired you to work with in the first place."

"Loki just ran off again, and you had to rescue him from the top of a construction site," Leonard pointed out.

"He did apologize for worrying everyone," Pepper told him.

"That probably has more to do with Tony than with me."

Tony waved him off. "All I've done is the stuff you've told me to do, like being consistent in enforcing the rules, and being patient with this recent fairness obsession even when I really want to tell him that life isn't fair and to suck it up."

"You could have gotten all of the same advice out of any modern book on child psychology or parenting."

"Maybe, but we both know I would never be caught dead reading those kinds of books, because that would totally make me look like a parent."

"It's not just Loki you've helped," Pepper chipped in. "I'm sure it's helped everyone around here just to have someone to talk to. You're a good listener."

"A lot of my Yelp reviews say the opposite." Leonard swirled the whiskey around in his glass. He had never been much of a whiskey drinker, but he found himself tempted to down it in one gulp. "My Rate my Professor comments kind of said the same thing, for that matter."

"Maybe you took some of those reviews to heart, then. Obviously, you've gotten better at it."

"There's also the conflict-of-interest issues, now that everyone knows I'm dating Bruce."

"I'm thinking that might have been a bigger issue when you weren't disclosing that information," said Tony. "But it doesn't matter anyway. Everyone here wants you to keep being their psychiatrist."

"I'm not sure that's true. I'm pretty sure Wanda and Pietro hate me."

"Wanda says she hates everyone," Tony pointed out.

I do hate everyone - (｀^´) ( ° ෴ ° ) ヾ

"Doctor Banner, to what do I owe this honor? I take it you didn't call me here just to catch up over pie and coffee. I'd also love to know why you're dressed like Mr. Robot, and why we're sitting in a diner in the middle of nowhere. Does your husband know where you are?"

"Leonard and I aren't married. Also, I don't think the character you're thinking of is actually Mr. Robot—"

"I wasn't aware you were dating Leonard." Not that he particularly cared who Banner dated, any more than he cared about the identity of Mr. Robot. "I was referring to your work husband."

Bruce scowled at him. "No one knows where I am right now, not even Tony."

Fury leaned back in the seat of the booth. "So, what is this, Bruce? You going on the run again? Want to tell me why? You aren't wanted by the United States government anymore. Even Ross knows you're off limits."

"I'm not running anymore."

Something about the way Bruce said that gave him a bad feeling. "I'm going to ask you again, why are we here?"

"I know SHIELD was working on a way to kill the other guy."

Damn. He figured this would come up at some point, after Romanoff dumped all those files online. If anything, it surprised him that it hadn't come up sooner. "Doctor Banner, I deeply apologize—"

The man blinked up at him from under the hood of his sweatshirt, and Fury noticed the dark rings under his eyes. "Don't. What I want to know is how close you guys got to a solution."

"A solution?" Right, now he knew what that bad feeling had been about. Banner wasn't running anymore. He wanted a solution. "Ah Jesus, Bruce—"

"I think I might have killed someone," Bruce blurted out.

Fury fixed the man with his one good eye. "Who?"

"It doesn't matter."

"Kind of does, Bruce. Is this a civilian you killed? An ally? An enemy? Was it even human?"

"It doesn't matter," Bruce repeated, staring down at the table in front of him.

"When you say you 'think' you killed them, how sure are you? Because you don't sound too sure."

"I remember the other guy smashing her into the ground repeatedly. That's not something anyone ought to be able to survive."

"Loki did."

"I've been thinking about that. The Other Guy couldn't have known he'd be that durable. If he had done that to anyone else—"

"But he didn't do it to anyone else until now. Tell me, who is this person you think you might have rag-dolled to death? Otherwise, I'm not telling you anything." Not that he planned on telling Bruce anything either way. There wasn't even anything to tell.

Bruce glared at him, but when he realized that Fury wasn't going to back down, he looked away again. "Loki and Thor went back to Asgard for a few days, and when Loki came back, he had a female bodyguard with him instead of Thor. Her name was Sif."

"Are you referring to the same Sif that fought the Destroyer in New Mexico?"

"I guess so. She was a friend of Thor's."

"Bruce, that woman is every bit as immortal as Loki was back when you smashed him into Stark's floor. I highly doubt you killed her."

"But I could have—"

"If she wasn't immortal? Somehow, Hulk's never done that to someone who wasn't. Maybe he knows the difference."

"A couple months ago, he broke Natasha's arm."

Fury shrugged. "Arms get broken. Natasha's broken plenty of bones before. Most of the time it's her own fault for not being careful."

Bruce slammed his fist down on the table. "It wasn't her fault this time!"

"Hey, just calm down." He wasn't sure what he had said, but it hadn't been his intention to piss the guy off. "I get it. You accidentally hurt a teammate. It sucks, but accidents happen."

"I'm not sure it was an accident."

"Maybe you ought to give yourself the benefit of the doubt."

"I can't do that when I might be putting more people in danger."

"Do I need to remind you how many lives the 'other guy' has saved? But you've decided those lives don't mean anything because a couple people got hurt. Why did Hulk even decide to smash Sif anyway? If I had to take an educated guess, I'd say it wasn't completely unprovoked. What did she do? And don't say it doesn't matter." Fury found himself in a staring contest with the man across from him, but even with one eye, that was a game he hardly ever lost.

Bruce backed down in less than five seconds. "It isn't a justification for what the other guy did, but she slapped Loki. I don't think she meant to hurt him, but the other guy didn't understand that."

"Just out of curiosity, was Loki around when the other guy hurt Romanoff?"

"What is that supposed to mean?" Bruce demanded.

Fury held his hands up between them. "Calm down, I'm not accusing Loki of anything, alright?" He might have, but by then he was almost certain that Loki didn't have any mind control powers without that scepter of his.

After he'd gotten shot, he'd stayed with the Avengers long enough to figure out that Loki wasn't a villain so much as he was a spoiled brat with an impressive amount of psychological and behavioral issues. It wouldn't have taken much for the real bad actors to have taken advantage of him. What was more, Stark, Banner, and even Romanoff had started to form attachments to him. He had seen Romanoff treat Loki like a younger sibling, complete with the obligatory threats to stay out of her room; and even though it was supposedly a "joke" that Stark had adopted the kid, he could tell the guy just wasn't ready to admit that he'd found yet another person he cared about more than himself. Bruce had been fussing over the kid like a new mother, seeing to it that he ate enough and dragging him off to take his temperature every time he so much as coughed. He'd almost felt sorry for the kid.

He had also heard about how Hulk had reacted to finding Loki crushed under a pile of fallen building. "All I'm saying is that maybe, both times Hulk lashed out and hurt an ally, it was because he thought he was protecting the kid."

"That isn't an excuse when no one was posing a serious threat to him."

"You can't expect the other guy to appreciate those sorts of nuances, Bruce."

"But you do think he understands the difference between mortal and immortal?"

All Fury really knew was that Hulk was a valuable asset to Earth's defense. "You know, you look like hell. When was the last time you slept?"

"I thought I took a nap this morning, but I—you know what, never mind. Look, are you going to tell me—"

"I'm not going to tell you how to off yourself, Bruce. Even if I knew I wouldn't tell you."

"So SHIELD never—"

"If we did, I didn't know about it. Although apparently, there were a lot of things going on that I didn't know about. Bruce, do you have any idea how much blood is on my hands? That includes the blood of allies. HYDRA murdered Howard and Maria Stark under my watch. I honestly have to wonder why Tony hasn't had more questions for me about that."

"I think he's just choosing to focus on the kids and leave it in the past."

"Did you just say kids, as in plural?" Maybe he needed to drop by the tower more often, because he seemed to be completely out of the loop now. "You people haven't adopted anyone else from your rogues' gallery, have you?"

"A couple of Sokovian kids hijacked Tony's private jet when we went to Latveria. They've been staying with us since then."

"So that was you guys at Doom's wedding. I figured as much, given who the bride was." Most people didn't know that the new Missus Von Doom was Thor's mom—the lucky , Fury wished he could un-know things like that.

Without any warning, Bruce stood up, and started towards the door of the diner. "Hey, Banner, where are you going? It's rude to just leave without saying goodbye."

Bruce stopped, but he didn't turn around. "If you can't help me—"

"Bruce, I'm going to help you." Fury figured he owed the man that much, after pulling him out of a blissful life of hiding in the remotest regions of the world and putting him on the world's center stage.

"But you said—"

"I said I'm going to help you, now sit down." He tried to make it clear that it was an order.

Banner wasn't the strongest willed person he knew even when he wasn't suffering from exhaustion, so Fury wasn't too surprised when the man came back. He made a gesture to the waitress. "If nothing else, I can make sure you eat something, because again, you look like hell."

Bruce hesitated at first, but then he sat down. While the waitress took his order, Fury pulled out his phone and sent a text under the table.

[(◞_◟)っ旦̆] 旦c(Ծ‸▼)]

"Sir," JARVIS interrupted. "You have a text message from Director Fury."

"You don't have to call him 'Director' Fury anymore, J. He isn't director of anything anymore."

JARVIS paused as if taking a moment to think, and Tony supposed that was exactly what he was doing, given his newfound sentience. "Very well, Sir. In that case, Uncle Fury is texting you."

Tony made a point of arching an eyebrow in the direction of JARVIS's camera. "Sorry—Uncle who now?"

"As you will recall, that is what Loki calls him, and you have repeatedly referred to us as siblings."

"Oh, for crying out—" Sentient or not, Tony had to wonder what cereal box JARVIS had gotten his sense of humor out of. "Just read the text, J."

"It says, 'Stop screwing around and come get your work-wife. Keeping him in one place as long as I can.'"

Bruce was with Fury? Tony jumped out of his chair and started looking around for his keys. "Did he give you a location, J?"

"They're in West Virginia, Sir. I'm sending the coordinates to your suit, since I'm sure you'll want to get there as soon as possible."

"Good thinking. Thanks, J."

Pepper stood as well. "Leonard and I can follow in the car."

"But it's at least a five-hour drive to West Virginia," Leonard complained. "How did he even get that far?"

"A Hulk at full speed can cover a lot of ground," said Tony. "Don't worry, I'll get there first and make sure he doesn't move."

"No, I'm going with you."

Tony wanted to ask if he was serious, but the look on Doc's face was the same he'd had when he'd insisted on talking down a seven foot six, one thousand one-hundred-and-fifty-pound rage monster. "You know the suit doesn't have a sidecar, right?"

Leonard picked up the drink he hadn't touched since Tony made it for him and winced as he knocked it back.

⊂(ﾟДﾟ;⊂)
⊂(oo⊂ )∘˚˳°

Leonard tried not to let himself think about how far up they were or what would happen if he let go of Tony's suit, which he had wrapped himself around like a koala bear around the branch of a tree.

"Hey, I know what will take your mind off how high up we are."

"Tony, please don't—"

"Ninety-nine bottles of bear on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of beer! Take one down, pass it around, ninety-eight bottles of beer on the wall! Ninety-eight bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-eight bottles of beer. Take one down, pass it around, ninety-seven bottles of beer on the wall. Ninety-seven bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-seven bottles of beer—"

"TONY."

"Ah, come on, doc. You know you're not thinking of how high up we are now, or of falling to your death."

"Now that you said that I am!"

"Hey, this was your choice. You could have gone with Pep in the car."

"Bruce is my significant other, Tony. I need to be there for him as soon as I can."

"You guys really call each other 'significant other?' That sounds a little, er—clinical, doesn't it? I guess you are both doctors."

"'Boyfriend' just sounds so—"

"Hey, what's wrong with it? Pepper is my girlfriend, and I'm her boyfriend. While I admit the English language is lacking in adult-sounding names for an intimate partner that don't sound stilted—like 'significant other'—when you're in love with someone, you're not supposed to care. Of course, I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that being in love makes you dumber, which could explain why you agreed to let me fly you across three states like this. You're not even wearing a parachute—"

"Maybe just stop talking about that."

"Have you guys even said it to each other?"

"What?"

"You know, those three little words that can change an entire relationship? Starts with 'I,' ends with 'you,' and there's that especially scary word in between?"

"I don't see how it's any of your business, Tony."

"Tell me or I'll drop you."

"WHAT?"

"Just kidding. So anyway, I'm going to assume you haven't, which means that Bruce didn't even say it to you after your heart attack scare. Jeez, that guy—"

Leonard's heart beat so loudly now that he could hear it over the rush of the wind. "It wasn't really a heart attack. And just because we haven't said it out loud doesn't mean anything. We have other ways of saying it."

"Nah, trust me, saying it takes things to a whole different level. Of course, if you're not even at a place where you're calling each other your 'boyfriend' like a couple of teenagers and not caring how dumb it sounds, maybe you're just not there. Even though you're willing to risk your life for him—"

Leonard clung onto Tony even tighter. "Has anyone ever told you that you ought to mind your own business?"

"Constantly." After a while, Tony started singing again. "Ninety-six bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-six bottles of beer! Take one down, pass it around, ninety-five bottles of beer on the wall. Ninety-five bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-five bottles of beer—"

Leonard decided that he'd rather listen to Tony sing than talk, so he let him.

π π ππ π ππ π π
ϢϢϢϢϢϢϢϢϢ ヽ(･ˇ∀ˇ･ゞ)

"No more bottles of beer on the wall, no more bottles of beer—"

Thank God, thought Leonard.

"—Go to the store, buy some more, ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall. Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of beer—"

π π
ϢϢ (ノ゜∇゜)ノ

"Twelve bottles of beer on the wall, twelve bottles of beer—"

"IF I HEAR ABOUT ANY MORE BOTTLES OF BEER, I AM GOING TO LET GO."

Tony paused, then began singing more quietly, "Ninety-nine bottles of Coke on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of Coke—"

Instead of giving in to the temptation to let go and plummet to his death, Leonard sang with him. "Take one down, pass it around, ninety-eight bottles of Coke on the wall—"

π π ππ π ππ π π
ϢϢϢϢϢϢϢϢϢ（＾Ｏ＾)ノ

Pietro scooped up the last of the popcorn they had all been sharing and shoved it in his mouth. What are we going to eat for dinner?" he asked with his mouth full.

"Tony said I could pick what we ordered for dinner tonight," Loki announced.

"Tony didn't tell me that," said Steve. "Didn't he just ground you again?"

Loki didn't want to admit that Tony had been trying to bribe him into letting go of the steel girder he had been wrapped around. "Fine, you've caught me in a lie." He hoped the others would get back soon. Steve wasn't a fun babysitter. He seemed to be in a bad mood for some reason. Tony had never officially said that Loki was grounded, but even if he was, what did that have to do with anything? It made him want to act out just to make a point, but he had promised Pepper that he would behave while she and Tony were out looking for Bruce.

He wished she would have let him come with her in the car, but as soon as he had asked, she had shot down the idea. "No, Loki. I know you're anxious about Bruce, but there wouldn't be much you could do to help, and it isn't your responsibility. There are some things you need to just leave to adults. There wouldn't be enough room in the car on the way back, anyway—I'm sorry if I've hurt your feelings, but that's just how it is." She had sounded so genuinely sorry that it had been impossible to argue with her, and now he was stuck here with Captain Sourpuss.

Steve looked over his shoulder at Zora, who had been sitting at the kitchen table reading while everyone else watched television. "Zora, you're our guest. What would you like to eat?"

Zora looked up from her book. "I'm not familiar enough with American food to know what I like."

"Perhaps—" JARVIS began, hesitatingly. JARVIS didn't normally speak until someone had spoken to him, but his recent discovery that he was a sentient being must have made him bold. "Perhaps I could choose the restaurant for once?"

Steve's eyebrows wrinkled in confusion. "But JARVIS, you don't eat."

JARVIS sighed, which Loki had never heard him do before."I know. But I'm always the one who has to place the order. I just thought it might be nice to have some input for once."

"I think we should let him," Loki said immediately, dying to know what the AI would choose. "After all, it is kind of like his birthday today."

Steve shrugged. "You know what, why not? At least that solves the question of who gets to choose."

"This is so exciting," JARVIS chirped. "Except I don't know what I should choose. Wanda, what do you want to eat?"

Something not too salty," Wanda told him.

Happy Birthday, JARVIS ┌iii┐

There were only four bottles of Coke left by the time Leonard realized that they had entered a descent. Leonard opened his eyes. What he saw was similar to the view out of an airplane—an airplane with no cabin walls, which was currently plummeting towards the Earth in a nose-dive. He shut his eyes again, telling himself that it would be fine, because Tony knew what he was doing.

He felt Tony's suit go vertical, and the movement slowed and stopped. "Hey, Doc, you can let go now."

Leonard opened his eyes and realized they were on the ground. But somehow, he couldn't let go of Tony; it took a couple of minutes to make his fingers unclench and his arms relax, and when he did, he ended up sliding down the suit and falling onto the ground onto his elbows. Luckily, Tony had landed in a patch of grass at the edge of the diner's parking lot.

He felt like a newborn foal and probably looked like a drunk as he made his way towards the diner's entrance. He attempted to push the door open, but it wouldn't budge. Tony clapped him on the shoulder, pulled him away from the door, and then pulled the door open for him. At some point while Leonard been struggling to make it across the parking lot, he'd taken his suit off, and now carried it in its case.

Leonard managed to gather himself enough to walk through the door without falling forward. After taking a sharp right turn, he made his way to the booth where he could see Fury sitting across from someone wearing an oversized black hoodie. He wondered where Bruce would have gotten a hoodie, but then again, Bruce must have gotten pretty good at finding replacement clothing over the years.

When he reached the booth, he grabbed hold of the back of that hoodie and twisted it in his hands. His eyes watered, making his vision blur. "I was so worried. You can't just disappear like that. Whatever is going on with you, we'll figure it out, okay? Because I love you, and I want to tell people you're my boyfriend even though it's stupid and makes me feel like we're in junior high. You know what? Let's get married, then we can just skip that. You'd better marry me, after I just risked my life trying to get to you. Not to mention I had to listen to Tony sing all the way here—"

"Sorry, but I don't think I can be your boyfriend, and I'm not looking to get married."

Leonard wanted to crawl under the nearest table and die, because whoever he had proposed to wasn't Bruce.

...φ(ｰ￣*)

Author's Note:

There's a Mr. Robot reference in this chapter that I almost took out, because Mr. Robot didn't actually premiere until 2015, but I decided to leave it in. After all, who's to say Mr. Robot wasn't released in 2013 in the EPL universe? It isn't the first time and it probably won't be the last time events in this story's universe get moved up a little.