Chapter 7: All for One, One for All

This chapter is my longest so far! Yay!
BUT (yes there is a but) it is only that long because it mostly sums up the movie and I'm sure you will recognize most of the dialogues since I quoted them mostly, but I also changed a few things!
I hope it won't bore you with this chapter and hope you enjoy it! ^_^

Natasha was at work when the phone call came. She saw the man go pale as Phil got him to give her the phone and had to smirk internally while she was simultaneously worried why he would disturb her interrogation. "We need you to come in" were Phil's first words, which made the feeling she had even worse, she wanted to ask what had happened but out loud she said to Phil over the phone "Are you kidding? I'm working." His next words didn't help either: "This takes precedence." "I'm in the middle of an interrogation. This moron is giving me everything." 'What has happened?' The Russian exchanged words of "I don't give everything." to his lackeys and Natasha gave him a look of that's-my-boss-I'm-talking-to-so-shut-up (she really had spent to much time with Tony and Clint). "Look you can't pull me out of this right now." 'If it isn't important and you made me worry for nothing…' Phil's stern "Natasha…" let her hold her breath for a moment. "Clint's been compromised." These three words let her see red for a moment and she said seriously "Let me put you on hold." Immediately she turned her attention back to the three Russians who were staring at her and she kicked their asses pretty fast and let the leader hanging upside down, while walking away. "Where is he now?"

"We don't know."

"But he's alive?"

"We think so. I'll brief you on everything when you get back."

"Does Tony know?"

"…Not yet. I'll tell him and you are needed to talk to the big guy before you come back."

Natasha stopped in her tracks and swore in Russian – Tony would kick her ass for being the first one to make contact with Banner (he had been like a fan boy about the Doctor and had wanted to talk to him soon to invite him into the Tower since he believed that the man needed a permanent home instead of being on the run from the military). She just hoped that it would end well…

Tony had just connected the last part to the prototype of the arc reactor that would power his tower (an improvement he had wanted to make for quite some time) when Phil turned up in the tower. He had a strange expression on his face that set Tony on edge and the fact that he held out an electronic folder towards him just deepened his bad feeling. "Fury wants you to look this over as soon as possible." Tony took the folder and wanted to open it when Phil laid a hand on it. "But before you do that, there is something that I have to tell you… Clint has been compromised." The glass with the coke he had been holding (he didn't drink alcohol, he didn't like the feeling of not being in control of his actions – even if his mouth sometimes ran away from him despite this) fell to the ground where it shattered into million little pieces, spilling the content on the expensive floor.

Phil guided him towards the nearest seat – careful as not to step on the shards of glass – were they sat down and he explained everything that had happened. A look of determination entered Tony's face just like the time when he had decided to return to the living. "Alright, I have work to do!" He stood up and let Jarvis project the contents of the electronic folder onto the holographic screens and began to study everything in it. Phil sighed at the sight and just hoped that Tony would at least sleep a bit this night – which was highly unlikely even without what was coming, the nightmares from Afghanistan still haunted his youngest charge most of the time – and turned towards the elevator to find Yinsen and tell him of the current situation to alarm him of the high possibility of injuries in the near future.

The next day everyone gathered on the Helicarrier – that Tony had designed for SHIELD after Fury's nagging – well everyone except for Tony. Phil got the chance to live out his inner fan boy for a moment in the presence of Captain America and maybe Natasha rescued his dignity when the two arrived on the Helicarrier with her presence and the words "They need you on the bridge. They're starting the face-trace" even if he technically wasn't really needed for that. But he understood her cue and excused himself. Natasha then tried herself on a bit of small talk with the Captain – analysing him in the process since she wanted to know what kind of person he really is before letting him anywhere near Tony (who was a bit touchy on the topic of 'Captain America' because of Howard's influence even if he tried his best for Phil not to). Fury had given her the file on him but she still like to do this personally since it concerned her младший брат and because she had heard that Fury had not given the Captain Tony's real file but the official one that stated that Tony was a playboy and didn't really care for others since he returned from his 'coma'. He turned out to be nice but didn't seemed to be the type to question a person's behaviour and the face he made when she mentioned Phil's trading cards had been priceless (she would have to talk to Tony to get a picture of it from one of the security cameras once this was dealt with).

When Rogers and Banner exchanged a few words she tried to get into contact with Tony to see where he was but instead got the word that they were ready to go and turned towards the two man to tell them to come inside.

Natasha smiled to herself when she saw Phil talking to Rogers about signing his trading cards. "Took me a couple of years to collect them all." 'Yes and you only got the last ones because Tony pulled some strings to give them to you on you latest birthday.' Natasha thought, while trying to contain the grin that wanted to spread on her face when she saw Phil's proud face about the fact that his cards were "Near mint."

Then finally a face match to Loki's was found and they made their way to Stuttgart in Germany.

There she observed the fight between Loki and Rogers while training the weapons of the Quinjet and thinking 'Where is Tony?'

As if to answer her question, AC/DC's Shoot to Thrill blared through the speakers of the Quinjet and Tony's – thanks to the armour – distorted voice reached her ear. "Agent Romanov. You miss me?"

She just grinned in answer even though he couldn't see it and watched as Iron Man rammed Loki into the ground.

"Make your move, Reindeer Games." Iron Man said while training all his weapons at the god and the Captain came to stand beside him.

Loki raised his armed slowly and his armour vanished – an obvious sign that he surrendered (a bit to easy for her taste and she was sure that Tony was thinking along the same lines).

On the flight back to the Helicarrier, Rogers spoke out what everyone was thinking, "I don't like it."

He and Iron Man exchanged a few words before Rogers finally said, "Fury didn't tell me he was calling you in." Natasha was sure that she would see a look of annoyance on Tony's face if she had been able to see it (but since she was flying the Quinjet and Tony had his helmet on, that wasn't possible) as he said: "Yeah, there's a lot of things Fury doesn't tell you."

Before Rogers could reply anything, thunder started rumbling in the sky. Natasha asked, "Where's this coming from?" since there shouldn't be any thunder coming down at this area according to the computers and Iron Man turned towards their prisoner as if he had the answer – which he seemed to have since he flinched at the sound.

The Captain asked if he was scared and at his reply of being "not overly fond of what follows" Iron Man seemed to have catched up on Loki's train of thought but before he could say anything, something landed on the roof of their Quinjet.

Iron Man opened the hatch and suddenly a blond haired man – Thor – entered their plane and threw him back with his hammer. Thor grabbed Loki and disappeared into the night. Iron Man followed instantly – not caring that Rogers wanted to make a plan at a time like this as if actions weren't more important right now than words. He just throw a "I have a plan: Attack!" at the Captain before diving after the two gods and Natasha agreed silently with him (not just because he was her little brother but because he was right).

Tony had tried to tell the thunder god that they were trying to find the Tesseract too but Thor wasn't listing to him and instead attacked him with lighting – the attack dwindled into a whole battle that destroy a great deal of the forest they had landed in till the Captain came and they finally stopped.

During the whole fight-for-Loki, the dark haired god hadn't escaped which only fuelled Tony's suspicions that there was a bigger plan in motion than they were seeing now.

Back on the Helicarrier, Loki was escorted to a cell that had not been designed for a god but had to work for now and meanwhile Iron Man stayed behind in the Quinjet where he shut down the cameras and changed out of the suit and into clothes Phil had brought him (his Blue Knives combo) when they had landed. Jarvis took over the armour that he had secretly stored on-board (with Phil's help) and stored the damaged one in his personal room that he had on the Helicarrier. Once outside of his room, he was greeted by the sight of Phil who looked him over to make sure he hadn't received any fatal injuries in his fight with the thunder god. Together they made their way to the bridge – the armour trailing after them – and there they met the rest of people that were supposed to make up the "Avengers Initiative" – minus Clint.

Tony and Phil were just in time to Banner's question of "What do they need Iridium for?" to which Tony immediately answered, "It's a stabilising agent." He then went into detail while taking in every detail on the bridge; ignoring the irritated look Maria gave him as he moved to Fury's place. For a moment he gave in to the urge of giving orders like on a real ship, enjoying the puzzled looks of the other Agents and then outing Jim (an Agent he had meet once before leaving SHIELD) who was playing Galaga – all that was just a way for him to cope with Clint's current situation. He then stared at the screens, covering one eye and then asked Maria "How does Eye Patch see these?" and got an emotionless "He turns." Tony played around with the screens and planted a small device that would make it easier for Jarvis to hack into the SHIELD database – all the while explaining the use of the Iridium to the others.

When he turned back he saw the looks Phil and Natasha were giving him that clearly stated that they knew what he was doing, so he turned towards Maria as he answered her question of when he became an expert on thermonuclear astrophysics, with a simple "Last night." and gave her look that stated you-shouldn't-be-surprised-by-that. He continued talking till Rogers interrupted him and Banner answered the question, after that Tony exchanged a few words concerning the current topic with Banner and finishing it with "Finally, someone who speaks English!" completely ignoring Rogers muttered, "Is that what just happened?" and shaking Banner's hand.

"It's good to meet you, Dr Banner. Your work on anti-electron collisions is unparalleled. And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage monster." The words seemed to make the Doctor uncomfortable - Tony saw Phil shaking his head in disbelief – and Banner just said: "Thanks."

Nick Fury interrupted the scene by addressing Tony to inform him that, "Dr Banner is only here to track the cube." 'Yeah, as if!' "I was hoping you might join him." 'That is why I am here like this and not in my armour right now, stupid Eye Patch…' Tony thought sullenly.

Now Rogers joined the conversation again with the comment of, "Let's start with that stick of his. It may be magical, but it works an awful lot like a Hydra weapon."

Fury turned to Rogers and replied: "I don't know about that, but it is powered by the cube. And I'd like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys." Thor looked puzzled at the reference and it followed a short exchange between him and Rogers of who-understands-a-simple-reference.

After that Tony simply left the room with Banner to the lab where they would use different gadgets to locate the Tesseract – the Iron Man armour following them without a word.

Despite the whole situation with Loki and a mind controlled Clint, Tony couldn't deny that he had fun working together Banner while calibrating the machines. He even got the chance to invite the Doctor to his Tower even if he denied with his excuse of "kind of broke Harlem" the last time he had been in New York. Meanwhile he tested Banner slightly to see how far he could get before the other man would say anything – not in the slightest afraid of the Doctor hulking out since the man had to have control otherwise he wouldn't have come even with SHIELD's 'invitation'.

But of course Rogers had to interrupt Tony in his 'testing' and was immediately scolded by the blond haired man as if he was earnestly trying to 'threatening the safety of everyone on this ship'! Please, he knew most of the men and women on board and despite his resentment towards some of them, he wouldn't endanger them on purpose!

Instead of mentioning that he just turned to Banner and declared, "You're tip-toeing, big man. You need to strut!" and again he was getting a slating from the Captain! But now he gave the other man something to think about by asking him questions about Fury's motives – because why didn't Fury call them in sooner (or at least Tony)? He was only rewarded with a "You think Fury's hiding something?" Was that man so dense? Of course Fury was hiding something: he was 'the' spy, even his secret have secrets! The last part he said out loud and again included Dr Banner into the conversation.

The discussion went a bit on until Tony had enough of Rogers and kicked him out with the words "Of the people in this room, which one is, A - wearing a spangly outfit, and B - not of use?" and he and Dr Banner were finally left alone again. Tony was really trying to give the guy a chance (for Phil) but the man was grating at his nerves with his demeanour and Tony just couldn't help it but to act like an ass towards the other man…

Tony complained about Steve to Banner to which the Doctor just replied that Rogers was kinda right about the fact that Loki was in the lead right now and Tony just couldn't stop himself from saying that he would be there when the situation would blow up in Loki's face, earning himself a strange look from the other man (Banner shifted his gaze between Tony and the Iron Man armour that Jarvis was still controlling. But instead of speaking what was on his mind, Banner just said that he would read all about it.

"Or you might just suit up with the others." Tony countered and Banner just started on how he didn't have a suit of armour but was an exposed nerve and this Tony took as his cue to tell the Doctor what he thought the Hulk really was: a good guy. To convince him, he even showed him his arc reactor in his chest (something he had only done in the presence of a selected few), telling him a bit about it and thus seemingly confirming the other man's suspicions about Tony being Iron Man (the man is a genius after all).

After his enlightening talk with Bruce (Banner had offered him to address him with his firstname), Tony excused himself for a bit to talk to Loki.

He sneaked up on the god who was sitting in the middle of his prison cell in a position that look like he was meditating and so he just said: "What have you done to Clint?" Tony enjoyed it that the god hadn't realised his presence before he had spoken (the only indicator of this fact being the slight tensing in his posture). The god opened his eyes and blue-green eyes stared into Tony's brown ones.

"Ah, the brother in bond of the hawk." Loki said as he stood up instead of answering Tony's question. "Barton told me about you: a young man that wears all kinds of masks – even metal ones - and only his inner circle is allowed to see behind them. A man that has killed many people so that he could go back, out into the world and who made himself a name while doing so. Blue Knives, was it?"

"That's in the past. I'm interested in the present and the future." Tony said evenly as if it wasn't bothering him that this god in front of him might know everything about him that Clint knew (which would mean everything!).

Loki inclined his head in acceptance of Tony's reply, giving him a curious look while murmuring, "An interesting answer…"

They stared each other into the eyes until Tony let out a sigh and turned to leave, he would leave the real interrogation to Tasha who was better at it than him (he had just wanted to at least try). He was almost out of the door when Loki's voice cut through the silence that had settled. "You were his supreme loyalty, you know - before I came. You even came before SHIELD." That made Tony turn back around, only to be met with a cruel smile as Loki continued, "I will enjoy the sight of him killing you and then I will free him long enough so that he can see what he has done!" Tony's face stayed emotionless as Loki said these words – only the slight twitching of his fingers for a knife betraying what he wanted to do – instead he tried to concentrate on Loki's expression: the cruel smirk, the cold blue eyes… had his eyes been that blue before?

Loki continued on how he would enjoy the scenario but Tony had stopped listening and just left the room, exchanging a look with Natasha who had waited for him to come out. He shook his head slightly and returned to Bruce, leaving Natasha to get Loki to reveal his plan.

Nick Fury was really getting slow in his old age since he had taken so long to discover that there was a security breach in his database but he made up for it with his (dramatic) entrance (= coat flowing after him). "What are you doing, Anthony?"

Tony stared evenly into Fury's one eye as he said in a clearly fake light tone: "Uh, kind of been wondering the same thing about you, Eye Patch."

"You're supposed to be locating the Tesseract!" Fury deflected angrily and Banner told him that, in fact, they were already doing so.

Meanwhile Tony looked through the data Jarvis had found, "Yeah, you'll get your cube back. No muss, no fuss. …What is 'Phase 2'?"

Suddenly Rogers was in the room, dropping a weapon on a table. "Phase 2 is SHIELD uses the Cube to make weapons! Sorry, the computer was moving a little slow for me." The last part was said towards Tony, while Fury turned his attention towards Rogers.

"Rogers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract, this does not mean that we... "

"I'm sorry, Nick!" Tony interrupted, turning a monitor around with the schematics of a rocket. "What were you lying?"

Steve expressed his disappointment to Fury and then Natasha, Thor and Phil joined them in the lab. A big argument began between the group until Rogers' focus shifted from the Director to Tony.

"Big man with a bodyguard in a suit of armour. Take that away, what are you?"

"Genius, billionaire, philanthropist." What he didn't say but thought 'as well as an assassin, Iron Man and little brother'

Rogers took a step closer so that they were standing face to face now and said with disgust to Tony: "I know guys with none of that worth ten of you. I've seen the footage. The only thing your bodyguard really fights for is for your purpose. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you."

The accusation made Tony angry and he felt the urge to punch the man into the face. 'What does this guy think he knows?! He hasn't even read my real file and just insults me even though he doesn't know me!' He felt Phil shifting slightly closer in silent support – his worship for Captain America clearly losing against his feeling for his charge –Tony taking encouragement from the action said out loud to the Captain: "I think I would just cut the wire."

"Always a way out... You know, you may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be some kind of hero."

Tony saw almost red at the statement and was barely refraining himself from really punching the man and instead lashed out with words to unwind a bit of the anger in another way.

"A hero? Like you? You're a lab rat, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle!"

Rogers wanted to retort something but then Fury's words of, "Doctor Banner, put down the sceptre." startled them all – even Bruce himself - and the argument with Rogers was for now forgotten. Before anything else could be said, the machines beeped to indicated that they had located the Tesseract.

An explosion made them all lose ground and everything turned into a kind of blur of action for Tony.

He remembered that he had directed Jarvis in repairing the damaged rotor, connecting the correct wires so that it would work again without much trouble.

The Captain was having his back the whole time till Rogers slipped and almost fell from the Helicarrier, which was why Tony had to use his ever present (but well hidden) knives on the intruders to give the other man the time to get ground back under his feet again.

Tony helped Rogers the last part back up and escaped being shot by a hair's breadth thanks to Jarvis who had directed the armour right into the guy that had trained his weapon on Tony.

After that he and Rogers had returned to the bridge (Jarvis brought the armour to Tony's room for repairs), once there they learned of Phil's death at Loki's hands but as soon as Tony had seen the bloodied cards, he had realised that the Director too was playing a game with them and not just Loki. So he grabbed the cards – pocketing them – and left the room to look for Natasha and thus Clint whom she had knocked some sense back into. He found them and then Tony together with Natasha made it clear to Clint that it hadn't been his fault! "The actions you undertook while under Loki's control were not your fault, understood?" Clint had nodded but Tony and Natasha had seen the doubt in his eyes so Tony just hugged him since he knew not what else to say (he never had been good with emotional stuff). Natasha joined the hug, and the three only let go of the others so that they could get ready to kick Loki's ass back to Asgard.

Tony returned to his room where he repaired the armour so that he could at least fly back to New York City – he had recognized Loki's diva act and the god needed a great power source, what better than an arc reactor? Once repaired satisfactorily, Iron Man flew to New York being closely followed by Hawkeye, Black Widow and Captain America in the Quinjet…

Iron Man had tried to destroy the machine that would open the portal for Loki's army but an energy shield had stopped him from doing so and so plan B was now in action.

He sat down on the landing pad but instead of letting the platform sink down like an elevator to his lab, he let it dismantle the armour out in the open (he was done hiding since Loki already knew of Iron Man's secret identity).

Tony left the platform and stepped into the penthouse where the God of Mischief was already waiting for him and made a beeline for the bar (which he didn't use but Pepper had once told him that rich people were expected to have some expensive alcohol stashed and so he had done so to keep up the appearance of rich party boy). At the bar his bracelets for his new prototype armour the Mark VII were located.

Meanwhile the dark haired god followed his movements closely. They exchanged a bit of banter until Tony had enough. "What do you think you can gain from this? There is no throne, no version of this were you come out on top. Maybe your army comes and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth, we will be damn sure to avenge it."

They only stood one step apart now and Loki raised his sceptre as he threatened: "How will your friends and your family have time for me, if they are so busy fighting you?" The sceptre touched Tony's chest but nothing happened, except for the light 'clink' resounding through the silence that had settled upon them.

Tony's heart rate returned to a more normal pace instead of the one that had wanted his heart to break through the arc reactor. Speaking of the arc reactor: it seemed to have shielded him from Loki's voodoo and the god seemed to be extremely confused that nothing had happened, so he tried again with the same result.

"That normally works…" Tony couldn't help himself but make a stupid quip at the god and got himself a free flight through his penthouse windows in return. Only thanks to his Mark VII didn't he end up as an unidentifiable puddle on the street.

The real fight began as the portal opened and soon Iron Man was joined by Hawkeye, Black Widow and Captain America and later even Thor. They fought the Chitauri and their flying whale monsters…

"That is like Budapest all over again!" Natasha said to Clint who was standing right beside her and to Tony through the communicator. Clint gave her a sideways glance, focus never leaving the oncoming Chitauri, and said dryly: "You and I remember Budapest very differently!" Natasha smirked and the heard Tony huff a laugh as he commented, "My sentiments exactly Clint!"

Later Bruce joined them, evening the odds with the other guys help in the battle and the Hulk even managed it to smash Loki into the floor of Tony's penthouse.

Everything went well – if you didn't count the endless coming Chitauri, the cracked ribs and broken leg Tony had suffered even with his armour protecting him and the explosions rocking in Manhattan – that was until Fury suddenly told him, "Iron Man, you have a missile coming in!"