There weren't a lot of things he was proud of in his life. His personality needed work. The cons he had pulled could always be improved. Projects weren't always successful (hello, Project Insight?). And his relationships? Get the fuck out of here.
But if there was one thing he would always be proud of and hold close to his heart, it would be the program he created that allowed him to access different databases without anyone noticing. Secretly, he called it ECHOnet - or the Entry to Computers without Help and by Oneself network. Openly, he just referred to his "program." Most people didn't question it, certainly not Q - she had a hard time with technology as it was.
Not only did ECHOnet have access to whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted, it also held an impressive amount of data and was constantly running different searches throughout various open networks in an effort to find keywords that fit the plug-in. And thankfully, it was coded specifically so that if anyone somehow found their way into it or noticed what it was doing, the program would bounce the person across the world. No one would find the central base, which came in handy over the past year while they were on their little adventure.
Except for when there was a sudden ping that came from one of the several monitors that were set up in the living room area. Dawson turned out from where he was rifling through the fridge to look over his shoulder at the terminal. It wasn't a normal sounding ping. Not the one that usually came whenever the program picked up some news about dead ex-Hydra agents, or the other that sounded when it picked up a pattern between the journal and the Hydra black box. No this was completely different.
Meandering over to the terminal, he held his energy drink in one hand while his other quickly tapped against a few keys to try and find the source of the ping. He pulled up a side program to run to see if there had been any sort of outside access. A moment later, the screen flashed with a confirmation code and a series of numbers that screamed virus. Someone had managed to wriggle their way into ECHOnet and seemed to release some sort of bug.
"Oh fuck me." he muttered under his breath. Setting his energy drink down, he bent over the keyboard so his fingers could fly against it. He followed the path the intruder had taken, seeing where it exactly it had gotten in (and making a mental note to patch it up), then through the various file folders and backdoors it had gone through and whatever else it had accessed, praying it hadn't taken anything of importance.
When he reached the end, he worked his way backward to find that whatever bug or virus it was had a specific intent. It worked its way through all the information ECHOnet had on both von Strucker and his experiments, and on the Avengers. The first part made a little bit of sense; he had assumed it was someone who had been watching them or someone related to Hydra, but the second was a bit confusing to him. And it didn't seem to be an attack - whatever the virus was hadn't erased anything at all, just...absorbed it. Like it wanted information on those two specific things. Nothing else.
While most would take it as a win and simply go back to restructure the defenses around ECHOnet, Dawson decided to take it a step further. He wanted to find out what exactly this bug was and who had sent it. For all he knew, it could be some Hydra thug who was about to come busting through their doors in search of Q. He wasn't about to let that happen.
Choosing to sit down instead of staying hunched over his terminal, he set himself up and fell into something familiar: tracking down the source of the virus. It was one of the first things he had learned when getting into his field of technological terror. A very simple thing to learn, granted, but something that had sparked his interest and was a clear building block in the development of his career.
"Earlier today, disaster struck Johannesburg, South Africa as the Hulk barreled through the city and destroyed buildings and homes." a news anchor reported from one of the television screens, "Officers tried to sedate and calm the monster down, relying on Tony Stark's Hulkbuster to help but efforts were unsuccessful. As officers tried to evacuate as many people as possible, Tony Stark took on the Hulk in a terrifying and explosive fight." It cut away to B-roll of the Hulk and Iron Man in some sort of double sized suit going on it. Roars echoed and blasts exploded on the screen, pairing nicely with the sounds of people screaming and random gunshots of lame help.
He glanced over his computer screens at the news, seeing the chaos of the city the Hulk had destroyed in a very Hulk-like way. The reporter kept talking about the fatalities and how not even Iron Man (eyeroll) could stop him right away. While it was a tragedy, Dawson wondered how it had happened.
Only having met Dr. Banner once before, during their time on the Helicarrier in 2012, Dawson got the impression that he had his Hulk tendencies under control. They wouldn't have brought him on the Helicarrier if he hadn't - and Dawson was sure Dr. Banner wouldn't have put himself in that sort of position if he wasn't confident in his ability to keep the Hyde to his Jekyll personality under control.
Before he could analyze it any further - though he knew he'd have to leave the true analyzing to Q, his program gave him a familiar ding! and drew his attention back to the screens. It had found the source of the bug.
"Oh you motherfucker." Dawson breathed out as Tony Stark's face appeared on the tv screen and the IP address of the Avengers Tower flashed on his computer screen. The bug or virus or whatever the hell it was came directly from the Iron Man himself. For some unknown fucking reason.
Soon after figuring out the source of the virus, Dawson began to make some calls. He knew he only had ample amount of time to make said calls before he became traceable, but he needed more information.
"Hill." Maria answered curtly. He was surprised she had even picked up. But he figured when working in government and with Stark, there was bound to be a ton of unknown/blocked numbered calls.
"It's Dawson." he identified himself quickly, wanting to get straight to the point, "Any chance you know about some sort of virus Stark sent against me?" he asked, hoping Maria knew what he was referring to.
"Uh, no. And kinda busy here. Dealing with other things." she responded, sounding as annoyed as he usually did when talking to people. So that's how it felt. He wasn't sure he liked it.
"Yeah, I've seen the news." he glanced at the television screens again to see that they were replaying the same B-roll footage, "What the hell happened?" he found himself asking, even though he knew he was running out of time.
"Something that's too complicated to get into in the next minute and a half." her tone was dry, knowing that he had a ticking clock, "They've gone AWOL until this thing cools down." she continued, still giving him nothing - but also weirdly something, "That's all I got for you, Dawson." she sighed, but he stopped her before she hung up.
"The bug - is there anything - is it connected?" he tried to get some pieces of the puzzle together before his time was out. Maria paused for a moment and his eyes darted to the clock on the computer screen, knowing he was almost out of time.
"Tony didn't send anything your way. On purpose." she added with a little bit of stress to it. Like it meant something more, "None of them know where you are." she finished knowingly, and referring to certain people without even saying their names.
"And they aren't going to." he told her, and then ended the call as the clock struck time. A close call - literally.
Next up was someone who could probably tell him a bit more about the Hulk attack and the consequences from a general point of view rather than being associated closely with the Avengers themselves. He shook off the rather curt call with Maria while he pulled up Sharon's contact information - praying she hadn't changed numbers since SHIELD fell.
"This is Carter." she answered after a few rings. He let out a slight breath before beginning to pace in front of his terminal. He wasn't so worried about timing on this call. Sharon was working with the CIA in Berlin, nowhere near them or any of the people who were looking for them. And he hoped that she wasn't one who was looking for them too (why would she be?).
"Yo, it's Dawson." he responded, hearing her take in a bit of a sharp breath.
"Jesus Christ, Dawson are you serious?" she asked out in a hushed, yet almost angry tone, "Where the hell did you disappear to? Is Q with you?" she fired off a line of questions causing Dawson to become annoyed rather quickly and pinch the bridge of his nose.
"I don't have time for this." he groaned, somewhat to himself, "I just need you to tell me what you know about the Hulk attack in South Africa." she sighed and then went quiet for a moment, almost like she was debating with herself.
"We don't know much." she responded carefully, that Agent Voice coming through that he knew so well, "But what we do know is that it took place in Johannesburg and-"
"Okay, I know the basics." he cut her off rather quickly, "I need to hear what the news isn't reporting, Shar."
"Fine." she all about snapped out, already tired of his attitude. She hadn't heard from him since SHIELD fell and now of all a sudden he was calling and asking about a random Hulk freak-out. "The CIA wants answers as to why it happened and why Stark's Hulkbuster couldn't contain him. Due to their tactical response, the issue of the Avengers' management and responsibility is being discussed. People are talking about creating some sort of...protocol to keep them in check. We're trying to bring them in for questioning."
"But they disappeared." he summed up, hearing her noise of agreement on the other line, "Any idea where they went?" he asked quietly, knowing she was privy to all sorts of things at SHIELD and could be holding back information as a way to protect her former co-workers and semi-friends until the CIA figured out what exactly they were gonna do.
"If I did, they'd be in questioning right now, wouldn't they?" she said in a tone that told him not to push it further. Just in case there were ears on the line. But he could tell there was also some truth to her response. Of course Rogers wouldn't keep his former ex-neighbor up to date on all things Avengers, including the location of some super secret safehouse. He sighed, shoving his hand through his hair,
"Alright, thanks, Sharon." he didn't bother to wait to hear what she said next, hanging up the phone instead.
Settling back down at his terminal, he used the multi-screen set up to run different things at once. One was working on finding out where the virus or bug or whatever it was had disappeared to, while the other was looking through all the reports coming in about the Hulk attack. He had no idea if they were correlated or not, but he could try to find out.
Not that this was usually his job. Q was the one always doing the cross referencing or the figuring out of patterns. Though after what happened in the Hydra facility, she had barely done anything. Not really leaving her room, barely eating and surviving on what seemed to be a diet of only alcohol. The world seemed to be too much for her and she was struggling with learning ways to deal with it. And it wasn't like there was a WebMD page for it, or even a ton of people who could help. The few that could were either a ghost story or someplace secure in who knew where. So he had to take it upon himself to play both the roles.
"Yo, Q." he rapped his knuckles against her closed door about an hour later. He had hit a wall. He was nowhere near closer to figuring out where the Avengers had disappeared to or where the virus had slithered off to. There was just a solid dead end waiting for him. He needed to bring in the big guns.
Slowly, he pushed open the door to her bedroom, unsure what he was going to find. Marina had gone in every couple of days to clean out empty bottles or snack bags, but she never really talked to their other partner in crime. Dawson had tried to whenever she stepped out of the room, but she didn't really contribute to the conversation. Mostly meandered around the house almost aimlessly, wincing every so often or letting out a slight groan of pain. All efforts on finding Bucky had stopped and he had seemingly gave up his case against ex-Hydra agents who had tortured him. The only thing they had now was the small interaction between him and Q and she wasn't exactly forthcoming with a ton of information. The leads they had on him were going cold and they were beginning to end up exactly where they had started.
Not in her room like he expected, he found her sitting outside on one of the beach chairs that faced the ocean. He crossed her room and opened the door to the deck area, making her turn to glance over her shoulder at him. A tired smile tugged at the corners of her lips and she let her head fall into her hand while her elbow kept her arm upright on the arm of the chair.
"Hey." she greeted him softly, "Sorry, I didn't hear you." he gave her a quick, reassuring smile and a head bob while lowering himself into the opposite chair.
"You doing okay?" he asked carefully, not wanting to come off worried or like he was checking in on her like a doctor would, but wanting to let her know that he cared and was there. She nodded languidly and then winced a bit at the motion,
"Just needed to drown out the noise." she gestured to the ocean waves that were crashing against the shore creating an almost white noise sensation. He figured the noise she was referring to was the one in her head since he hadn't been that noisy all day. Or at least he hoped he hadn't. "What's up?" she asked, shifting gears and her position on the chair. Pulling one leg up and tucking it under the other, she half turned so she was facing him more.
"Uh, need your help with something. If you don't mind." he added on as a second thought. He was being so careful with her lately, not wanting to set her off or whatever. He hated it. Hated how what happened in the Hydra facility had changed both of them - one directly and one indirectly. God, if there was a way to make time move faster, he'd take it; he wanted to get over this weird adjustment hump they had been stuck in for a while.
Tapping at the tablet he had brought out with him, he then handed it over to her. While she read through what was on the screen, he explained what had happened earlier that day. From the virus to the Hulk attack to his calls with certain people - being quick to tell her that the call was secure and untraceable.
"So I just need to know if you know of anywhere they would go to lay low for a few days while this blows over." he gestured to the tablet she was holding, "I at least need to get in contact with Stark to see what the hell this thing is." he added almost bitterly, but also as an explanation as to why he was so focused on finding the Avengers. "Maria said something about how he didn't do it on purpose…" he trailed off. She met his eyes, brow furrowing a bit as she tried to work through what he meant by that.
"Who's with them?" she asked for a little more detail. If she knew which Avengers had been on the trip then it could help narrow down places they would go. Somewhere secluded where no one, not even the other Avengers, realized existed.
"Uh, Banner, Stark, Thor, Barton ...Nat and Rogers." his throat tightened at the mention of the final two Avengers. The only two who meant anything to either of them. She blinked at him, withholding a flinch at the other two names and choosing to focus on the others. Her brain flicked through the various file folders she had on them, almost picture perfect despite how long ago she had worked on their profiles. She hadn't touched most of them since 2012, except for Steve and Natasha's, but somehow all the others were crystal clear to her. No doubt a side effect of the serum.
"The homestead." she realized softly, eyes widening a bit, "They went to the homestead." he made a face, clearly not knowing what she meant by the vague answer of a homestead. He wasn't even sure he knew what a homestead was.
"What homestead?" he asked, annoyed that he didn't know about this oh so secure location.
"Clint. Barton, he has a farmhouse. In Missouri. I helped set it up as one of my first SHIELD assignments." she explained, talking a bit faster than she usually did as if trying to get all the information out at once.
The memory came to her clear as day even though it was something she did over ten years before. She remembered Halliday tasking her with finding said place, saying it was of the utmost importance. An introduction into the world of working with semi-superheroes. Her first real SHIELD project as a real SHIELD agent. Something to be celebrated, but she was more nervous than anything. She couldn't fuck it up.
She took it seriously, more than she had anything before. Looking at everything they had on Clint and Laura, finding the perfect location, and making sure it was as safe as possible. The homestead was in the middle of nowhere Missouri, made for Clint's family to live after he was recruited into the SHIELD program. Previously, he and his wife had been living in some city that became too risky to stay in after a few close calls. And with a baby on the way, it was clear that they needed somewhere more family friendly.
"Made sure it was secure and kept off of SHIELD's radar. No one knows about it except for Fury." she summarized, not wanting to give away too much too soon.
"And you." he pointed out. She pulled down the corners of her mouth and nodded a bit. With all the projects she had been assigned to since then, the homestead hardly seemed like anything worth while. In fact, she had all but forgotten about it until he brought it up and she wondered if she would've remembered had it not been for the serum.
"And me." she agreed. He scoffed and sat back in his chair. Of course she would know about a secure farmhouse location. He shouldn't have wasted so much time on trying to do it himself. God, he really did need her didn't he?
"Guess we're going to Missouri." he reached over to take the tablet back from her, already intent on making up their travel plans. A nervous look slid over her face at the use of the word we, which referred to how they were both going to go.
"We?" she repeated, leaning forward slightly, "No, Dawson, I can't go with you." she shook her head, already knowing what was waiting for them at the farmhouse. An awkward reunion.
"Ha!" he barked out a laugh, "Bold of you to assume that I'd be leaving you here by yourself or splitting up again." he shook his head. As much as he wanted to go to Missouri alone and figure everything out himself, the stupid little voice inside his head was telling him not to. The last time he ignored that voice, Q had spent twelve days inside Hydra.
"I won't be alone. I'll have Marina." she argued back. He fixed her with an unamused look. She raised her eyebrows at him, daring him to challenge her.
"You're coming with me. I need a navigator." he made his tone final, hoping that Q wouldn't argue with him. She opened her mouth to, brain already outline all the different ways she could go about the argument and then coming up with her odds of winning against him. An immovable object, as her mind figured out.
"Fine." she gave in, shoulders slumping. She came to terms with the fact that arguing would be pointless. She'd be going no matter what.
"Maybe this'll be good for you." he said after a beat, giving her an almost hopeful smile, "Maybe this is what you need." referring to who was unknowingly waiting for them at the homestead. He didn't know if that were true or not, but maybe it could be.
Maybe they both could get the answers they wanted.
A/N: I know there wasn't like...any action in this chapter but I needed a way to bridge everything together! I hope you enjoyed it nonetheless. Please don't hesitate to leave a review or whatever! Love hearing all of your thoughts!
Also did you guys see Far From Home? I LOVED IT SO MUCH?! What were your thoughts? Also this would be a good time to tell you that I'm working on a Peter Parker/OC story that centers around Molly Proctor (aka Q's sister!) Do we like/dislike this idea? Let me know!
Thank you for taking time to read this story and for favoriting and following and reviewing! Love you all!