We arrived at SHIELD's main ship with Loki and Thor. Natasha, Thor, Captain, Bruce Banner(AKA The Hulk) and I were in the conference area. I was sitting in the middle of the conference table, cross legged, my navy blue hat pulled tight around me head, standing out from my blonde hair.

"He really grows on you, doesn't he?" Bruce chuckled, talking about Loki who was imprisoned.

"Loki's going to drag this out." Captain said. "So, Thor, what's his play?"

"He has an army called the Chitauri." Thor said. "They're not of Asgard or any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the earth. In return, I suspect, for the tesseract."

"An army. From outer space."

"So, he's building another portal." I muttered.

"That's what he needs Erik Selvig for." Bruce said.

"Selvig?" Thor questioned him.

"He's an astrophysicist."

"He's a friend."

"Loki has them under some kind of spell. Along with one of ours." Natasha said.

"I want to know what Loki let us take him." Captain said. "He's not leading an army from here."

"I don't think we should be focusing on Loki." Bruce said. "That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You can smell crazy on him."

"Have a care how you speak!" Thor demanded. "Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard and he is my brother!"

"He killed eighty people in two days." I said. There was an awkward pause.

"He's adopted."

"I think it's about the mechanics." Bruce said. "The iridium. What did they need the iridium for?"

"So the portal won't collapse like it did on his shield." Tony said as he walked past the table to Thor. "No hard feeling, Point Break, you got a mean swing." He walked over to the computers. "Also, means that the portal can open as wide, stay open as long as Loki wants." Tony looked down at the people who working below us. "That man is playing galaga. Thought we wouldn't notice. But we did." I shook my head in amusement at his sharp eye. Tony looked back at the computers. He covered one eye and looked at the computer in front of him. "How does Fury even see these?"

"He turns." Maria said.

"Sounds exhausting." He began touching the computers, continuing to talk, emotionlessly, more interested in the computers than explaining to us of what he found out. "The only main thing that he needs is a power source." He turned to us and snapped his fingers rhythmically. "Something to kick start it."

"When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?"

"Last night."

"Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?" Captain asked.

"He has to heat the cube to a hundred and twenty million Kelvin just to break through the coulomb barrier." Bruce said.

"Unless, Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect." I said.

"Well, if he could that then he could achieve Heavy Ion Fusion at any reactor on the planet."

"Finally, someone who speaks English." Tony walked over to Bruce to shake hands.

"Is that what just happened?" Captain muttered, obviously confused on what was being said.

"It's good to meet you, Dr. Banner. Your work on anti electron collisions paralleled. And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage monster."

"Tony." I cooed.

"Thanks." Bruce said.

"Dr. Banner is only here to track the cube." Nick said, coming up to us. "I was hoping you and Miss Pricing would join him."

"Sir, that's mainly physics." I said. "My mind does not do well with physics."

"Let's start with that stick of his." Captain said. "It may be magical but it works an awfully lot like a hydra weapon."

"I don't know about that but it is powered by the cube. This is where you might come in handy, Miss Pricing. I'd like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men that I know into his flying monkeys."

"Monkeys?" Thor questioned him. "I don't understand."

"I do!" Captain exclaimed, excited about his new knowledge. Tony rolled his eyes and I bit back a laugh. "I understood that reference."

"Shall we play, Dr.?" Tony asked.

"Right this way, Sir." Bruce turned and headed down a hallway. I extended a hand towards Tony and he helped me off the table then followed after Bruce.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAA

"The readings are definitely the same to the ones of the tesseract." Bruce said as he scanned the scepter. "But it would take weeks to process."

"If we bypass their main frame and direct a route to their homework cluster we can clock this around six hundred teraflops." Bruce chuckled. I stood beside him looking at the screen in front of me, reading the diagrams of the scepter.

"All I packed was a tooth brush." Tony laughed at that. He walked towards us.

"You know you should come by Stark Tower sometime. Top ten floors, all R&D, you'd love it…it's candyland."

"Thanks but the last time I was in New York, I kind of broke…Harlem." Tony walked around me to the other side of Bruce.

"Well, I promise it's a stress free environment. No tension, no surprises." Tony jabbed Bruce in the right side with something.

"Ow!"

"Hey!" Captain walked into the room.

"Oooh, you're about to get patronized." I said, squinting my eyes at the diagrams.

"Nothing?" Tony questioned Bruce.

"Are you nuts?" Captain demanded.

"It's been noted before." I said.

"You really got a lid on it, haven't you?" Tony asked. "What's your secret? Mellow jazz? Bongo drums? Huge bag of weed?" I laughed.

"Is everything a joke to you two?" Captain asked.

"Funny things are."

"Threatening the safety of everyone on this ship isn't funny. No offense, Doc."

"It—It's all right." Bruce said. "I wouldn't have come aboard if I knew that I couldn't handle—" He eyed the object in Tony's hands. "Pointy things." Tony walked away to grab a bag of blueberries from the counter.

"You're tiptoeing big man." Tony said.

"You need to focus on the problem, Mr. Stark." Captain declared.

"You think I'm not. Why did Fury call us in? Why now? What isn't he telling us? I can't do the equation if I don't have all the variables."

"You think Fury's hiding something?"

"He's a spy. Captain, he's the spy. His secrets has secrets. It's bugging them, too, isn't it?"

"Uh…" Bruce and I stuttered. I went to another computer to get away from the group and pulled up the same diagrams, still trying to decode them.

"I just want to finish my work here." Bruce said slowly.

"Doctor." Captain demanded. Bruce sighed.

"A warm life for all mankind. Loki and Fury about the cube."

"I heard it."

"Well, I think that was meant for you." He pointed to Tony and Tony held out his bag of blueberries to him and Bruce took some. "Even if Burton didn't tell Loki about the tower, it would still be all over the news."

"Stark Tower? That big ugly…"

"Watch it." I growled as Tony frowned at him.

"…building in New York?"

"It's power by an arc reactor. Self sustaining energy source." Bruce explained. "That building will run itself for what? A year?"

"It's just a prototype." I muttered, flicking stuff across the screen.

"So, what didn't SHIELD bring them in the tesseract project? What are they doing in the energy field in the first place?"

"I should probably look into that. Once Jarvis is done breaking into all of SHIELD's secured files. Amber?"

"Jarvis?" I asked the AI.

"I am 47.7% done, Ma'am." Jarvis said. Tony looked at me questioningly.

"Yeah, I had him jump into the system. Temporarily of course."

"I'm sorry did you say—" Captain began.

"Jarvis has been running it since I hit the bridge." Tony said. "In a few hours, I will know every secret SHIELD has every tried to hide. Blueberry?" Captain ignored the offer.

"And yet, you're confused on why they didn't want you around."

"An intelligence agency that fears intelligence? Historically, not awesome."

"I think Loki is trying to wind us up. This is a man who wants to start a war. And if we don't stay focused, he'll succeed. We have orders. We should follow them."

"Eh," I shook my head. "Tony and orders? They—they just don't go well together. It's just not his style."

"And he's all about style?"

"Of the people in this room, which one is A wearing a spangly outfit and B not of use?" Tony asked.

"Steve," Bruce said. "Tell me that none of this smells a little funky to you."

"Just find the cube." Captain snapped and he walked out of the room.

"That's the guy my dad never shut up about?" Tony muttered. "Wondering if they should have kept him under ice." Bruce chuckled. "You finding anything, Love?"

"Jarvis, pull up the periodic table, please? My head is killing me and I can't think straight." I said. The table popped up onto the screen and I skimmed through them, muttering the uses of each one to myself. "Nothing so far."

"The guy's not wrong about Loki." Bruce said. "He does have a jump on us."

"What he has got is a dynamite kit." Tony said. "It's gonna blow up in his face. And I'm gonna be there when it does."

"I'll read all about it."

"Mmhmm, or you'll be suiting up with the rest of us."

"You see, I don't get a suit of armor. I'm exposed. Like a nerve. It's a nightmare."

"You know, I have this cluster of shrapnel, trying every second to crawl its way to my heart." Tony tapped his reactor. "Amber has one too. But this stops it. This little circle of light. It's a part of me. Of her. Of us. Not just armor."

"It's a terrible privilege." I said as I pulled up palladium's element.

"But you learned to control it." Bruce said.

"Because we learned how." Tony said.

"It's different." Tony flicked the information on Bruce's screen to the side so they could talk face to face.

"That much gamma exposure should have killed you." I said.

"So you're saying that the hulk…the other guy…saved my life? That's nice. That's a nice sentiment. Save it for what?"

"I guess we'll find out." Tony said as he returned to his computer.

"You might not like that."

"You just might."

"Palladium!" I exclaimed. Bruce and Tony stared at me, confusion written all over their faces. "Palladium, that's how Loki's been controlling people's mind."

"I thought palladium was a metal." Bruce said.

"It is." Tony said. "So, Am, do you want to share more of your thoughts to us?" I was quiet for a minute. I knew it was palladium but how was it? I looked around the room thinking until they feel on the tip of the staff. I jogged over to it and examined it closely.

"This is made out of palladium." I finally said. "As long as this is in contact of the person, Loki can use any sorcery that he wants. Palladium is the perfect conductor."

"It seems more to it." Bruce muttered. I thought about it again.

"The palladium holds the person intact. Long enough exposure to palladium, palladium will produce a poison. That's why Tony and I had to find something else to power the reactor. The palladium inside of us was producing a poison into our bloodstream and it would have killed us before the shrapnel could." Tony came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me and kissed my cheek.

"Excellent work, Love." He whispered into my ear.

"Yeah, well, we still need to find the cube."

"And we will."