"I can't believe I'm going along with this," muttered Buddy Pine.
"You'd prefer prison?" asked Coulson pleasantly, leading the erstwhile killer down a pristine grey hallway.
"As if any prison could hold me," Buddy snorted.
"Ours could," said Coulson. He stopped outside a sleek black door, punching a code into the keypad with a maddeningly mild expression.
Buddy remained silent—a talent he had learned to appreciate during his months of solitary recovery—and waited to see what lay behind the door. It had been a week now since Coulson invaded his cheap apartment in Chicago, and under threat of prosecution by this Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcements, and Logistics Division, Buddy had decided that he was quite simply too damn tired to run. That cramped, low tech room was getting boring anyway. So here he was, several colourful interviews later, certain that the man called Fury was keeping that good eye on him through every flashing security camera in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s remote facility, but ready to do whatever Coulson had planned if only for the sake of doing something.
He wasn't too enthused about the room Coulson led him into, though.
"What is this, a jungle gym?"
"It's your training complex."
With great disdain Buddy surveyed the equipment scattered across the room, from parallel and uneven bars to a tire course, all surrounded by platforms of varying heights and sizes around the perimeter of the room.
"I don't need training," Buddy growled. "I've been working with my tech for over a decade. I think I can handle it."
Coulson's blithe smile was far from placating. "Yes, you're certainly competent with your technology. Your fighting technique, on the other hand, could use some work—as well as your fitness." He paused for emphasis. "Lots of work."
Buddy had to inhale deeply to remain calm, remembering the troupe of armed S.H.I.E.L.D. agents that had descended on him the first time he lost his cool during an interview with Fury. "So…you think you're going to teach me to fight?"
Coulson shook his head. "Not me. Her."
There was a delay of about three seconds between the moment Buddy turned to see a black-clad, red-haired agent emerging from beneath one of the nearest platforms and the moment he had to raise his energy cuffs to ward off her leaping attack. Training.
He hated training.
"Nice try, Romanov. But you can't hide from my scanners."
Buddy smirked, huddled away in a corner far above the gym. Romanov's smoke grenade filled the room with a white haze, and he keyed his scanner in the direction of her last position behind a shelter wall on what she affectionately dubbed the 'dance floor.' In three weeks of combat practice, he was quickly learning her patterns. Today seemed to be an off-script day, though; his scanners detected no heat signatures behind her shelter or beneath his platform—where Romanov would usually mount a sneak attack after a diversion, having grown accustomed to Buddy's own habit of taking the high ground.
"Alright, maybe you can hide…" Buddy muttered. He kicked his rocket boots into action (handling more intuitive than ever since the boots replaced his own damaged feet), hovering past his platform toward the center of the room to initiate a more rudimentary visual scan. The thrust of his boots cleared away the smoke directly beneath him to reveal…a leaping Romanov, shock cuffs already engaged and flashing dangerously. She was too quick for him, and before he had a chance to catch her in an energy field she had grabbed one of his metallic ankles and pulled him down to meet the crackling blue of her cuffs. The jolt that ran through his heart stretched to the tip of his remaining fingers and tingled all the way down to the ground, where he landed in an unceremonious heap next to the neatly flipping Romanov.
"I win. Again."
"I scanned there," Buddy grumbled. "How did you fool my scanner?" No skeletons lying around in here, are there? he complained privately, remembering another who had once tricked his reconnaissance tech.
"Took an icy mint I had R&D whip up for me," breezed Romanov, holding out a hand to help him up. When Buddy accepted it with his good hand, he flinched.
"Yeesh! You're ice cold!" Despite himself, he was impressed. "Erased your heat signature, huh?"
"Obvious flaw in your very outdated scanning method." Romanov rolled her eyes. "Could that thing even detect you? You're practically a robot."
"I'll have you know I'm 72 percent certified flesh," said Buddy, bristling. "I could show you, but I'm not familiar with company policies on harassment just yet."
Romanov's stone cold stare did nothing to encourage his angry flirtation. Apparently her pointed stroll out the door did nothing to discourage it, either.
"Let me know if you wanna take a rain check on the harassment!"
"Tomorrow, 1400 hours. Training," Romanov fired back their usual sparring time, never looking over her shoulder.
Buddy sighed, flexing the fingers of his right hand. There was still a light prickle in his fingertips, and he found himself unable to resent it as much as he wanted to. He looked around the room at the sprawling equipment, the uneven bars that he could now flip around with decent skill and the tires that he could just barely pass through with his short legs. All his successes and failures here—mostly failures—had made it feel more like home than he would have expected. He grasped at the anger and the injustice that still lay rooted in his heart, trying to force it back to the surface before he lost himself. He was only doing this for selfish reasons, right? There was a shadow creeping in now, a white-and-blue spectre crowding his heart with a gappy smile and an optimism that disgusted him. Incrediboy.
Buddy shook his head, walking away from the training room toward his sparse quarters with part discontent and part resignation.
How the hell did I get here?
It wasn't until he was celebrating his first victory in training that he posed the very same question to the usually tight-lipped Romanov. She was dusting herself off with a spark of respect in her eyes, and he capitalised on her brief moment of esteem for him.
"So what's the point of all this?" he wondered. "I mean, you know what I've done. Coulson knows what I've done. Why bring me in? Instead of, you know. Bringing me in."
A cloud passed over Romanov's face. "Maybe we've all done bad things. Doesn't disqualify us from doing better things."
Buddy filed away that defensive response before pushing his query. "But why would they take that chance on me? There must be a reason, but every time I've tried ask Coulson he's ducked me. The man is very good at being evasive."
Romanov smirked. "Evasiveness is a prerequisite here," she said flatly, turning to leave. "Good night, Pine."
"We appreciate your cooperation so far. I managed to negotiate with Director Fury to present you with a gift." Coulson smiled, indicating a sheet of shining metal on the workbench.
"You mean an incentive," replied Buddy, though he eyed the sheet with interest.
"Call it what you like. It's a new alloy we've synthesized to mimic the properties of vibranium. They tell me it's a pretty close match to the real thing, and nearly as indestructible."
Buddy frowned. "What, I've jumped through all these hoops for your bosses—I still haven't forgiven you for the psych evaluations, by the way—and I'm still not worthy of the real thing?" He made a show of looking around the R&D floor, glaring at the scientists milling around. "Where's the original sample you told me about?"
"It's in use," said Coulson, patient as ever. "I can assure you this will do just fine. You can use it to produce new Zero Point Energy cuffs, on one condition."
"Let me guess: you want the patent?"
"You have to paint it black. Field uniform regulations."
Buddy's cynical smirk fell away. "You mean…"
"Welcome to S.H.I.E.L.D., Agent Pine."