Hi. *giggles nervously* I'm back. For... *eyes looks away guiltily* three months? *ducks behind a table to hide* Ohpleasedon'tbeangrywithme. I'm so sorry! I just... there's school problems, then family problems, then fandom problems, and personal problems... I just... I'm very sorry. And here's the update for ya.
Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson or Avengers.
I'm feeling fine women and wine
Fooling myself as I keep my heart blind
Hoping memories can die
It's taking some time to find peace of mind
But when I don't dream I do alright
So I'll stay awake tonight
~Stay Awake, Angus DanuChapter 4: Bruce Banner
"I barely understood anything you've said," said Percy, spinning around on the office chair boredly. "Are you speaking English?"
The demigod had been forbidden to touch anything again on the lab without Tony's permission. The first he did, well, nothing happened. But the second time he did touch something, a corner of Tony's lab blew up. Percy had emerged from the small explosion looking sheepish and unruffled.
Since then, he'd been threatened by Tony if he ever touched anything without the genius's permission, he'll be blast by Dummy's fire extinguisher that seemed to always show up with every explosion on the lab. The demigod had been lucky that Dummy wasn't there a while ago.
The genius brought down the diagram with a swipe of his hand, sighing. "That's because you're not made of the smarter stuff."
"I'm not that dumb!"
Tony turned to him, raising an eyebrow. "Then why are you kicked out by every school you were enrolled?"
Percy sighed exasperatedly, slumping on the office chair. He seemed not to be surprised that he had that tidbit of information. The chair creaked sadly beneath him. "Try having dyslexia. And ADHD at the same time. Combine the two. What'd you get?"
Tony winced in sympathy. "Ouch." Then he grinned. "I'm too smart for school, anyway."
The demigod snorted, spinning again on the chair. "'Course you are."
Tony pulled up the latest calculations on the information he'd snuck from SHIELD's files on Loki's staff. The staff was safely hidden away by SHIELD, but he figured he will do the nicking for another day. "So, Hero of Olympus, is it true that you saved it? The home of the gods? At the age of seventeen?"
The demigod blinked at the sudden questions. "Well, seventeen, no." Percy's green eyes—not Loki's poisonous green eyes, he idly thought, his own brown eyes flicking to his calculations and observations—glinted with mischief and something else. "Sixteen, yep. With the help of forty demigods, of course. Can't do it alone."
Tony whistled lowly. "Of course," he repeated slowly. "How, exactly?"
Percy stopped spinning the chair, expression blanking out. "There's this war—"
Tony's heart halted. "War?" he choked out. He could feel the darkness and the frigid cold biting him even with his suit on—he shuddered. "But you were sixteen!"
It was surprising that a lot of people got it worse.
Percy spread his hands. "What can we do? At the time, gods practically can't interfere with their children's lives." The thunder rolled outside. "Yeah, yeah," he muttered. "Anyway, we're demigods. At twelve, they'll give you a knife and they'll say, 'Honey, you'll need this to protect yourself against the monsters that will try to kill and eat you. Stab that thing over there." He shrugged, eyes darkening. "Most demigods don't ever reach the age of seventeen or twenty."
Tony got a feeling that the last statement wasn't finished. He wisely didn't comment on it. The air hung heavier now, and the genius was starting to regret that he ever brought the subject up, if not for the sake of curiosity.
Spinning again on the office chair, albeit slightly slower this time, Percy asked, "How's Pepper?"
Tony's brow furrowed. "What about her?"
The demigod frowned, sea green eyes meeting brown eyes across the translucent blue diagrams. "Hadn't she told you?"
Tony felt his hackles rise. "Told me what?" he asked, frustrated. If anything happened to her...
Percy sighed. "She almost got kidnapped. Luckily, I was just walking home late, thanks for a school project. I heard her scream. The two had a knife, and I just, well..." He shrugged, a smile tugging at his lips. "She's okay now."
The genius felt his shoulders sagging as he relaxed one more. "Yeah, she's that all right. She's a tough nut to crack."
Percy smiled, spinning in his chair. "That she is." When he got bored again, he idly said, "Did you know that I blew up Mt. St. Helens by accident?"
Tony choked on the coffee he'd been drinking.
The demigod squinted and bounced on the balls of his feet, trying to see between the people bustling around.
The airport wasn't fully crowded, and there was a select few who looked like vacationists. Some were New Yorkers, meeting friends and families, and Percy had yet to see Bruce.
"Is he here yet?" asked the demigod, fidgeting.
The billionaire shook his head. "Nah. I think we're early."
Percy shot a glare at him, crossing his arms and tapping his foot impatiently. "You know I hated waiting."
Tony had known. The kid had extreme ADHD that he had shown last night that kept them both awake by barraging him with questions about this and that, and had traded stories of his own out of sheer boredom. Soon, he finally persuaded Tony to touch something in the lab ("Just touch it, I promise! I swear I won't press any buttons. Or anything else.") and managed to survive the night with wide eyes and 'oohs' and 'ahhs' every time Tony introduced something to him, and a thrown 'If you didn't know your father, he could be Hephaestus' comment.
Tony perked up, pointing. "There he is!"
The demigod followed the finger and saw the man, who was trying to make himself invisible by hunching forward. Tony started forward, lifting sunglasses for disguise (it worked like a miracle) and the demigod followed behind. When the scientist saw them, he smiled at Tony but sent a confused look at the demigod.
"Brucie!" said Tony, delightedly childlike, spreading his arms like hoping for a hug.
Bruce dipped his head, smiling. "Thanks for coming." Sending another look at Percy, he said, "Who's the kid? Surely you didn't kidnap someone to test your experiments on him?"
Tony placed a hand on his chest and shook his head in mock-hurt. "You wound me, Science Bro. Nah, I would never. Though I would love to —"
"Hey!"
"—I would like to have a permission from Perce first."
Percy arched an eyebrow. "Oh, it's Perce now, isn't it?"
Tony leaned towards Bruce conspiratorially and whispered, "Fury recruited him as an Avenger."
The scientist's eyes widened. "What?" he whisper-yelled, like the information was confidential (which it was) but he'd been too shocked to muffle it. "But he's only a kid!"
The genius began to lead them to his car with Happy waiting inside. Thankfully, the car he picked wasn't that flashy, adding to his disguise, though it caused much grumbles from Tony. "And apparently a badass one too."
Percy crossed his arms. "I may be a 'kid,' " he said, qoutes prominent, "but wait till you see what I'm capable of. Besides, looks could be very deceiving." He shot a look at the new companion beside him.
He'd been debriefed by Tony of what Bruce was in more complicated and science-y terms, but finally resorted to telling him that Bruce turns to a the Hulk when angered.
Tony grunted. "His name is Perseus Jackson, and he's a demi—Ow!"
Percy removed his foot from the billionaire's own, smiled and reached out a hand to Bruce. "You can call me Percy."
"That's my foot!"
The scientist shook his hand, looking torn between being confused and laughing at the two. "Bruce. Bruce Banner."
Percy grinned, green eyes twinkling. "Nice to finally meet you."
"Do you know how much this shoes cost?" Tony whined.
The demigod rolled his eyes at Tony. "I'm sure you have enough money to buy another one."
"Let's just get into the car," said Bruce, sighing, though a small smile curved his lips.
After Bruce had settled somewhat into his new floor, Tony had wasted no time persuading the scientist to his lab. Both of them had been holed up in Tony's lab, and haven't got out ever since.
Percy couldn't bring himself to join them—he was sure he wouldn't be able to understand a fifth of what they would be saying. So he wandered about the tower. Then he met Dummy.
And the demigod decided to eat, since he was getting hungry, and figured that the two weren't going down to join him anytime soon. It was a large possibility for the both of them—especially Tony—to forget that their stomachs needed food too.
When he raided the refrigerator, there wasn't anything worth eating that he could find, so he wrinkled his nose and abandoned the search.
Then he checked the cupboards. There were a lot of ingredients and whatnot in them.
He never really tried cooking before—his Mom was always the one cooking for him. (And her too, he thought with a sharp pang in his chest) But from what he'd seen, omelettes looked like the easiest he could copy.
He suddenly had an idea. "Hey Dummy," he called the robot, which had been following him since they met. "How would you like to feel like helping me in the kitchen?"
The robot's arm/camera thingy lifted up, and Dummy nodded enthusiastically.
Percy grinned. "Great!"
He immensely regretted the idea soon after.
"Dummy, no! It's a fork, not a spatula!"
Dummy was a terrible cook.
"Sir, it looked like one of your omelettes is burned. Again."
And he was, too.
If the grey smoke was any indication whatsoever.
Percy threw up his hands, one of which was sticky because he cracked an egg the wrong way. "Fine, I quit!"
He began cleaning the mess, wishing he had his buddy Jason's powers because the smoke present in the kitchen didn't have any suggestion to thin out very soon.
Right. He will never ever going to try to cook again.
Percy hesitated at the sink. Last time he got near water, the circumstances hadn't been very unpleasant, but bearable enough.
What happened last week made him fear for his element even more.
He shook his hand, trying to dispel the sticky mess. Oh, for Hades' sake… He turned on the tap water.
And was promptly blasted off by the thin jet of water that burst from the tap.
"What happened, kid? We were just informed by J that something happened down here, and it's a first, we did not do anything —Woah!"
Amazing how one could hear Tony's chatter even a few feet away.
Percy stared at the two of them with a vague apologetic expression. "Sorry I wrecked your kitchen."
"Jesus Christ, kid," said Tony, staring at the kitchen with horror. "What did you do?"
Percy blew a wet strand of his hair out of his face and frowned. His hair was getting shaggy, and he hadn't anytime to command that he wouldn't be able to get wet. "I'm hungry."
"And you decided to make a lunch," finished Bruce. "Which was a stupid idea, since you can't."
Percy commanded carefully to make himself dry, and sighed in relief when he felt the coldness vanish. Bruce jumped an inch in the air, but Tony only grinned.
"That's cool," he said, eyes glinting excitedly, but then he sighed, "but you should have said to JARVIS to order takeaway. And saved us this mess."
"Yeah, well, sorry again," said Percy sheepishly, raking his hand through his now-dry hair. Bruce continued to stare.
The genius grimaced. "Could you, like, use water to clean this?" he asked, sweeping his hand, wriggling his fingers like a magician.
Percy was surprised that Tony was able to take it by stride. "Sorry, but uh, no dice."
Bruce, finally breaking from his trance, went over to close the tap, which was dripping and the stove, which still had a pan with the burnt omelette. "Wow. Just... wow."
The green-eyed teenager smiled wryly. "I'm a demigod. Half-god, half-human. And my father is Poseidon, god of the seas."
The scientist withdrew, his eyes widening. He shook his head. "You're a what now? And I thought that the Asgardians are the only existing gods."
Tony nodded, grinning. "Yep. Just when you thought things are crazy enough, they would even make you crazier. But still, he haven't still performed any water trick for me, Aquaman. The one earlier doesn't count."
Percy winced at the nickname. Leo was bad enough giving them, but now he had Tony... The demigod frowned. "That's the problem. After the, uh—" he hesitated, "—incident last week, I haven't got to use it properly." He winced again, feeling terrible and useless.
"What—?" Bruce started to say, but Tony elbowed him to shut up with a stern look, which was unlike Tony at all that Percy blinked.
The genius turned to him, brown eyes softening fractionally. "I can wait," he said cheerfully.
The demigod stood up, smiling gratefully at Tony. "So, how do I clean this?"
"Leave it to Dummy," he said dismissively, causing the said robot to lower his arm rather dejectedly. "He'll clean it up."
While they were eating, Bruce couldn't quite contain the question he'd been intending to ask since the kitchen incident.
"How long you'd known you were a demigod?" he blurted out.
Percy started, pausing halfway to eat his pizza. "I was only twelve that time," he began, and Tony and Bruce shared a look. The demigod seemed not to notice. "It all started in an educational field trip, thanks to Yancy Academy. Things started to grow crazy since then."
With that introduction, Percy started to weave a story with words full of Furies, his mom, his best friend who was a satyr...
Bruce stared at the demigod, who was sprawled across the couch, fast asleep. "Wow," he said for the nth time that day. "That was some bizarre story."
After they had clean-up; namely, putting the pizza boxes away (there had been half of the vegetarian pizza that Bruce left. The two boxes of pizza supreme had been devoured by the two), they had been back to find their storyteller demigod asleep.
Maybe Bruce will be able to bribe them with real food next time.
Tony shook his head, just as amazed as Bruce. "Yeeesh. Imagine that."
Bruce looked at the genius and met his eyes seriously. "There's something wrong with his story."
Tony hummed in agreement, eyes narrowing. "With the Annie-girl."
Bruce rolled his eyes. Trust Stark to remember something as simple as a name. "Annabeth," he corrected.
"Yeah, that." The genius frowned, brown eyes assessing. "Like she, I don't know, left him behind?" He frowned harder, his eyebrows slanting downwards; an expression he usually wore when he's so focused on one thing. "Gone?"
The scientist shot him a look, and Tony held up his hands to placate him. "May seem a little bit harsh, but it may be the truth. Besides," he said, "demigods don't last long, he said earlier."
"Yeah," murmured the scientist. "Hey, how come he's asleep at a time like this?"
The genius let out a long breath. "He didn't sleep last night. At all. Said he couldn't sleep, so I kept him awake in the lab."
"You two? Why?" asked Bruce, concern lacing his words even if he only just met the green-eyed teenager this morning. Amazing how Percy could get the people around him to like him in less than a day.
Tony looked at the demigod with something close to sympathy and understanding. "Nightmares. I should know, I have a fair share of them."
Bruce stared at Tony, but he wasn't looking at him. Now he knew what looked familiar with the teen: it's the battle-weary stare, the same dark, haunted look in his eyes behind the cheerful mask that he didn't hide very well, because the pain that he was feeling may as well as be too fresh for him to bear.
And he'd seen it from the genius, too, even if Tony had hid it pretty well.
Glancing back at the teen, he sighed. "And to have them at this early age… "
Tony started to rise. "That's just a story for when he's only twelve years old." He gave the sleeping Percy a sorrowful look over his shoulder. "What do you expect from him now that he's seventeen?"
The scientist sighed, pushing up his glasses at the bridge of his nose. Babysitting just got a lot harder for Bruce.
Awww, Bruce is sweet! I dunno, but this chapter ended up being mushy and angst-y or whatever. On my point of view. Once again, I apologize this for being late.
Aviendhaphiragon: And there will be more of Loki's POV!
FireSenshi2: Awww. Yep. But I have more plans for him.
Monkey dragon: Well, not as soon as I planned… *cringes*
Someone: Welllll, here ya go!
UpDownAndAllAround: Thanks! Maybe you could help me by pointing out some?
TheInsaneM: Thank you so much!
BoneMeal: Well, maybe because for me, Percy had changed.
Guest: Thank you!
ANGEL FALLEN FROM HEAVEN: Thank you, and I will keep writing! (Hey, you're an SPN fan, maybe you could check out my other story?)
L: Thanks Elena for the continued support! And yes, I am considering becoming an author someday.
TryMe626: This is the new chapter! Thanks for the review!
Arthena818: Thank you, but I apologize again for this being so late.
Scarlet Nightshadow: Thank you, and yep, that was really necessary. :D
Anna: Hahaha, thanks for the advice and review. :)
Sameen Hadiya: Thank you so much! uwu
angierocks: Yeah, thanks for being so perceptive about the story! ^_^
nicki1253: I haven't planned yet, so now that you mentioned it, I think meeting her would be nice.
~BloodDarkerThanCrimson out.