A/N: An unexpectedly busy week had me concerned I wouldn't finish this week's update in time, but I was determined not to keep you all hanging after Chapter 15's cliffie! For my American readers, I hope it's a nice addition to the holiday weekend, and for everyone else, takes the edge off Sunday night and the start of a new week! Thanks, as always, to my awesome beta reader Malintzin, and for all my readers!
16. No Rest for the Wicked
"Uh, Bruce?"
A frequently used phrase when he and Tony worked together in the lab, and Bruce responded without looking away from his screen. "Hmm?"
"Did you forget to put up the sign?"
A less frequently used phrase, which made Bruce look at Tony over the rims of his glasses. "Sign? What sign?"
"No Girls Allowed in Clubhouse. Preferably house spelled with a w and the s written backwards, but I'm not picky."
"I…don't follow," Bruce mumbled with a shake of his head as he reverted his attention to the project. Out the corner of his eye, he saw Tony gesture; he tracked the sweep of the hand to the lab entrance, where Pepper, who'd stayed in New York for the long Fourth of the July weekend, stood with Natasha. "Oh, I wish we'd put up a sign."
In the past couple of weeks, he'd gotten used to Natasha dropping in on him in the lab while he worked, or bringing her own work with her to do here, with him, in companionable silence. Nevertheless, he hadn't expected her to visit today. Not after he'd compromised the mission. She'd kept out of his way during the flight back to the Tower from Pakistan, which was what he'd wanted. Even now, as she came in with Pepper, Natasha seemed to hold herself at a distance, moving warily. Like she had when she first approached him in May about moving in.
"Quick, hide Veronica!" Tony stage whispered, shoving his way between Bruce and the desk to commandeer his workstation and minimize windows.
"Veronica?"' Pepper raised an eyebrow.
Tony gave her a long look, then with a flick of his hand brought their project back up. "On second thought, I'm not going to hide Ronnie away like some dirty little secret. I'm not ashamed of our love, are you, Bruce?"
"It's not what it sounds like," Bruce said before it occurred to him the warning was unnecessary; despite Tony's reputation as a former playboy, Pepper didn't seem at all concerned about other women, by Veronica or any other name.
"Luckily for you, I'm not really sure what it sounds like," she said. "Natasha?"
"No damn idea," she replied, eyes on Bruce, but he only allowed his gaze to touch hers briefly before darting it back down to his desk, feigning interest in rifling through the notes and sketches littered on the sleek surface.
There were times when he appreciated that Tony demanded attention, and this was one of those times.
"Bruce has a filthy mind," he said.
Well-maybe appreciated was too strong a word for how Bruce felt about this particular attention-grabbing moment of Tony's.
"Not that I can really blame him," he went on, "when we've been getting up close and personal with this beauty."
Stepping around the workstation, with all the flair of hosting his own personal Stark Expo, Tony made another hand gesture that brought a 3D rendering of what had been on the screen to the center of the room. The women studied it without comment, Tony's gaze darting between the two of them, eagerly awaiting their reactions. Bruce continued shuffling and shifting the papers, their reactions the very last thing he wanted.
After a long moment, Pepper offered, "A new suit?"
"She's…curvy," Natasha said.
"Hey," said Tony, spreading his arms wide, "we're body positive science bros."
"Some women come home to find their boyfriends trying on their shoes or dresses," Pepper said, turning to Natasha. "Mine experiments with robotic armor in varying body types."
"And names it Veronica," Natasha added, smirking.
"Actually what you're looking at now is called the Hulkbuster," Bruce said hastily, leaving the desk to approach the group before Tony could gleefully tell them why he'd chosen the name. "Which is the reason for the bulk."
Tony huffed in disapproval. "I prefer the term full figured."
Apparently, it had become Bruce's habit to glance at Natasha after Tony said things like that, because her eyes were already on him, giving him a knowing look before she rolled them toward the ceiling.
With slightly more effort than before, Bruce pulled his eyes back to the model, manipulating it with none of Tony's flair.
"The Hulkbuster suit is the Mark Forty-Four, but it's operated by the Mark Forty-Three. From inside. A suit within a suit."
"Inceptioned," Tony said.
"No, more like those Russian nesting dolls. Baba…Babushkas?" Bruce stumbled over the word, suddenly self-conscious about attempting to pronounce a Russian word in front of an actual Russian.
"Or Matryoshka," she said.
It was the only Russian word he'd heard Natasha speak, he realized. The language suited her husky voice. At once he tried to banish the thought from his mind, scratching the back of his neck where his hair tickled it just above the collar of his lab coat.
"Yeah, those."
"Operated from within," Pepper mused, eyebrows drawn together beneath her bangs as she circled the Hulkbuster image studying it from all angles. She stopped opposite Bruce, head snapping up, eyes wide. "You mean Tony would operate it to fight you?"
"The Other Guy," Bruce said.
He'd stopped scratching his neck to clutch the curling ends of his hair between his fingers, tugging hard enough to make his scalp tingle. Behind the lenses of his glasses, his gaze darted around the circle, not lingering on anyone, unable to bring himself to look them in the eye. Especially not Natasha, who he saw in his periphery had folded her arms across her chest, shoulders hunched in a protective stance he recognized. Protective but wary, gaze trained on him in an unblinking stare.
"I don't know what Tony told you about our mission to Pakistan," he said, "but…well…Things didn't go according to plan. I, um, went green and jeopardized the mission."
"Not really the words I'd use to describe it," Tony said.
"Don't think I want to hear the words you'd use," Bruce countered.
He half-hoped Natasha would contradict this, that she would say his role in the mission had been anything other than a disaster. However, she remained silent. What could she say?
"We were lucky no one got hurt this time. Well, no one but Hydra agents…" His throat tightened, making it painful to swallow. Chitauri were one thing, but human beings, even if they were the "bad guys"-killing didn't sit well with him. "But it's foolish not to have a backup system in place for subduing the Hulk if he gets out of control."
"So you're going to haul that suit around on all of our missions, just in case?" Natasha said.
"Romanoff," Tony said. "Do you really think our brilliant minds would come up with something so basic?" He waved his hand, flinging away the Hulkbuster diagram, and pulled up Veronica. "The suit'll be up in space. Contained in a satellite I can activate and have delivered anywhere earth in, oh, seconds. I'm going to ask if Jane Foster can consult on that part…"
"But Veronica's more than a suit delivery service," Bruce said. "She's also a containment unit. So hopefully Tony will never have to fight me."
"The suit's the fail-safe for the fail-safe," Tony said.
"I see." Pepper watched the animation for a moment. "But why Veronica?"
"Pep, I just told you-"
"I mean the name. Or do I want to know?"
Tony looked at her as though this were the most obvious thing in the world. "From the Archie comics."
Bruce turned away and resumed pretending to be busy at his workstation, hoping it would end there. He thought Tony's name for the project was funny, in its way, but not a lot of people shared his sense of humor. Even Betty used to say he got a little dark for her.
"Oh," said Pepper.
Thankfully, she let it go at that, and proceeded to grill Tony about whether he was going to spend her entire last day in New York holed up in the lab being a nerd; when Bruce stole a glance at Natasha, he saw her face was blank, as though she didn't understand. Super spy, master assassin, Avenger...but the Archie comics were before her time.
His gaze lingered too long. Noticing his stare, Natasha abruptly turned away and strode from the lab, leaving him to be Pepper and Tony's third wheel.
With a sigh, Natasha minimized the work files she hadn't been able to concentrate on since her visit to the lab. Although it was far past a reasonable hour to still be sitting up at her desk, she opened her browser. Her fingers rattled across the keyboard, typing veronica archie comics into the search bar. The Google results came up, and she hovered her mouse over the top one, finger poised to click on the Wiki entry for Veronica Lodge when her eye skimmed down the second link: Betty and Veronica (comic).
That alone was enough to explain why Tony chose the name for his Hulk-defense project, and why Bruce hadn't been able to look at anyone when Pepper asked about it. Apparently Natasha was a glutton for punishment, because she clicked the link anyway and spent the next few minutes getting up to speed on the history of Archie, the well-liked, well-intentioned, and bumbling teenager who lost his mind over pretty girls, and his longstanding love triangle with Betty, the quintessential girl-next-door, and her frenemy Veronica, the spoiled, sometimes selfish rich girl with a flair for up-to-the-minute fashion.
She closed her laptop and swiveled her chair around, biting her thumbnail as she mentally chewed on this new angle to the topic that had already preoccupied her all afternoon. Though she'd experienced the Hulkrage up close-closer than any other member of the team, in fact-she'd also gotten more personal with Bruce than she suspected the rest of the team had, as well, except possibly Tony. It seemed cruel that Bruce felt the need to help his best friend build a machine to subdue him, crueler still that Tony would give it a name linked with his ex.
A grouping of new art prints in the small sitting area caught her eye. The modern abstract paintings of earth tones broke up the monotony of grey wall. Bruce helped her pick them out online after their visit to the Met. She'd chosen next day shipping because why not, if it was on Stark's dime? They'd arrived while she was in Pakistan. Pepper had gone frame shopping with her this morning, and helped her hang them before their visit to the lab, where she'd hoped to find him mellowed out after the unplanned Hulkout rattled him.
"JARVIS?" The rasp of her own voice was jarring after hours of silence, the only sounds the tap of the keyboard and the click of the mouse, or the occasional grind of her chair's wheels against the plastic floor mat.
"Yes, Ms. Romanoff?"
"Dr. Banner wouldn't happen to still be in the lab, would he?"
"In fact he is."
She put her hands on the armrests to push to her feet, only to pause. "Is Stark with him?"
"Mr. Stark retired to the penthouse with Miss Potts, in concession to her early flight back to Los Angeles."
"Now there's a euphemism if I ever heard one," Natasha said as she stood. She lifted her arms over her head and rocked up on her toes to stretch.
"Mr. Stark programmed me with an impressive amount of tact."
"Impressive because he has none himself."
"Shall I tell Dr. Banner he's to have a visitor?" JARVIS demonstrated his tact again.
"Probably run away if he knew I was coming," Natasha muttered as she bent to retrieve the sneakers she'd toed off under her desk. She hadn't meant to say that out loud.
"I could lock him in."
She looked up with a quirked eyebrow, as though she thought she'd actually see an English butler standing there, like Downton Abbey, hands clasped behind his back, dry humor concealed beneath a dignified mask even a super spy would envy.
"I was, of course, joking," JARVIS explained.
"Of course," she echoed, smirking a little as she crossed her room. "I'll surprise Dr. Banner."
Bruce did look surprised to see her, the opera aria that filled her ears as she opened the door having muted her entrance into the lab until he happened to look up from his desk. Natasha studied him as she approached, observing the way he didn't sit up straight in his chair so much as sit back. Recoiling from her, almost.
After the mission, on the quinjet, she'd given him the space his body language demanded, shoulders hunched, headphones clamped firmly over his ears. Blocking out the world, including her. At the time, she hadn't taken it personally; she had some experience, after all, with silencing multiple voices in her mind. But did he think they were never going to talk about what happened?
"Natasha," was the only thing he said now.
"Still working?" An unnecessary question, answered by his mere presence here. Unfortunately, she had a pretty good idea that was the only kind of question that was going to get any kind of response from him.
Bruce took off his glasses, watched his fingers carefully fold the earpieces. "You know what they say. No rest for the wicked."
A cliché, but actually a good line. That gave her a few angles to work.
"What's Stark's excuse?"
The corners of his mouth twitched upward in a smile. A weak one, but Natasha would take what she could get.
"Come on," she said. "Take a walk with me."
Now it was her turn to be surprised when he didn't protest, just nodded and pulled off his lab coat. He joked that he should have left it on as they stepped out of the Tower into the pre-dawn chill, and Natasha offered to lend him her hoodie.
"You're very chivalrous," Bruce replied, "and also very petite."
"Suit yourself, Big Guy."
They didn't talk anymore after that; although they often walked silently together down Park Avenue, this wasn't the companionable kind Natasha was used to with him, despite the banter that preceded it. In concession to the cool temperature, Bruce had shoved his hands into his pockets, which made him walk with hunched shoulders. His tension was almost a tangible thing. Even so, by wordless agreement they walked straight to Greenacre Park.
Always an oasis in the midst of New York, the seclusion of the place enveloped them even more fully in the middle of the night. Only the roar of the waterfall on the far side broke the silence, its orange backlight drawing them toward it like moths to flame as they passed beneath the velvety shadows cast by the high stone walls. They bypassed the patio area where they usually sat, but Bruce cast a longing glance at the snack bar.
"Can't believe they're not open twenty-four hours. I could go for pie and coffee right now."
"Even Costco frozen pie? You must be desperate."
"I forgot to eat dinner."
"Veronica's a lousy girlfriend," Natasha said, and Bruce let out a snort of bitter laughter.
She sat on the furthest stone bench, the waterfall behind so that she faintly felt the cold spray at her back.
"Well isn't this romantic?" she said, looking up at him as he remained standing in front of her, hands still buried deep in his pockets. "We've got the place all to ourselves."
"It's a little disappointing," Bruce replied, "learning that people in this city do sleep." One hand came up to rub his neck. "Just not us."
"I'd offer to sing you a lullaby," she replied, "but all the ones I know are all vaguely terrifying. Russians seem to think the best way to get kids into bed is to make them too afraid not to be."
"Maybe they should write one about me."
"Yeah. Thinking about what a boring dork you are would put even the worst insomniac right to sleep."
"Natasha…" He said heavily, hand sliding down the back of his neck to fall to his side, as though the ends of his fingertips were weighted. "I appreciate what you're trying to do, but please don't make light off-"
"How would you know what I'm trying to do, when you've avoided me for the last day?"
Bruce glanced away, the light from the waterfall illuminating the flicker of his cheek muscle. "I thought you might appreciate a little personal space, after the Other Guy invaded it."
"I told you, I'm not afraid of-"
"You should be!" His voice reverberated off the concrete walls of the park. "Natasha, I haven't transformed involuntarily since the helicarrier. Yesterday I did it in a roomful of human trafficking victims. I could have-"
"You didn't. You didn't even try to hurt them. You smashed up the lab."
"Which isn't why you brought me along. You needed me to actually be a scientist and figure out what Hydra was doing there, with those people."
He'd cooked her eggplant parmigiana, Natasha thought. To thank her, after the Fridge, for making him feel like he was good for more than just his ability to smash things.
"We brought you along because you're part of the team. Both of you. The mission was a failure because Hill's intel about the scepter was wrong, not because you transformed. But even she doesn't consider it a total failure. We did take out a Hydra cell-rather efficiently, I might add, once the Big Guy went out to play."
Shaking his head, he turned away from her.
"Bruce, come sit with me." When he didn't move, she tried another tack. "The Big Guy actually listens to me, you know."
He pivoted back to her, brow furrowed. "What…what do you mean, listens to you?"
"I told him to stop scaring the kids and lay off the lab so the SHIELD scientists would have something left to examine. He kind of grunted about SHIELD, but he did stop. Then I told him to go outside and help Tony smash Hydra."
"And he did it?"
"Didn't have to ask twice. Please don't make me ask you again. It'll hurt my feelings."
Bruce shuffled toward her, lowered himself onto the bench, putting as much space between them that he had to be falling off the edge. Natasha slid over so that their shoulders touched. Through their sleeves, she felt his muscles tense.
"So the Other Guy took out Hydra troops," he said. "The fact still stands that I had an uncontrolled transformation in very close quarters with civilians."
"The civilians triggered your transformation."
"No, that's not how it works."
"Isn't it? Uncontrolled rage at a perceived threat?"
"To me."
Natasha gave him an incredulous look. "Those people were blind, Bruce, but you're myopic."
He shifted beside her, reaching into his breast pocket for his glasses. "Hyperopic, actually. They're just reading glasses."
"Myopic and a smartass." Growing serious, Natasha said, "Think about it, Bruce. You unexpectedly encountered a dozen vulnerable women and children who were being held captive and subject to abuse. I don't need to spell out how your subconscious may have worked that out into protective rage."
"No. You don't." Bruce seemed to be grinding his teeth, then he exhaled the tightly coiled tension in is shoulders seeping out of him as he raked both hands through his hair.
"I'm sorry. I know you don't like to think about your past, but-"
"Where are you going with this?" He turned his head, looking at her sideways from within the crook of his arm.
"You're in there. Even when the Other Guy takes over…"
She didn't like the term, because she was starting to think that Bruce's insistence on dissociation from his alter ego was detrimental to his ability to get control and harness his potential. She also knew if she wanted to get through to him, she'd have to meet him halfway.
"You learned how to change at will," she went on. "Why can't you learn to take control and change back, too?"
"It's a nice thought," Bruce said, "but once I let the rage take over it's like a wildfire. It just has to burn itself out. You saw that in Pakistan. The Other Guy threw boulders around once he ran out of tanks to turn into scrap metal. We were lucky the UN trucks Hill sent took their sweet time arriving, or he would've gone after them. I'm not willing to take that kind of risk again. Hence Veronica. You of all people have to appreciate a fail-safe."
"Of course I do. And I'm not opposed to the idea of Veronica-although the name's pretty tasteless."
To her surprise, Bruce smiled at that, the first genuine one she'd seen from him since the mission. "It's sweet of you to be offended on my behalf, but I actually kind of like Tony's irreverence." At her arched eyebrow, he added, "I think it's an acquired taste."
Natasha considered this. For all Bruce claimed that people should be afraid of him, he truly didn't want them to be.
"And I guess you're too much of a dork not to want to build the fat robot that comes out of a satellite, even if it is meant to beat you up?" She nudged his shoulder with hers, and he chuckled softly, eyes crinkling at the corners.
"That, too."
"The thing about fail-safes," Natasha said, getting up and facing him, "is that they're meant to be plan B when plan A fails. So what if plan A doesn't fail?"
"There is no plan A."
"I think there could be. Did Tony tell you what happened when you were lobbing boulders around?"
Bruce's eyes rounded. "Why, what happened? I thought nothing happened."
"I approached you."
"Hey, Big Guy," she'd said. "Bruce was supposed to go for a sunset walk with me. Can he come out and do that?"
"Natasha," said Bruce, getting up. "Are you out of your mind?"
"He didn't mind. Actually, he seemed kind of happy to see me."
In fact, he'd snorted and stomped in obvious disapproval of her mention of Bruce, then picked up another, smallish boulder.
"Okay then," she'd said as he lumbered around to lob it in the direction of the setting sun, "mind if I just hang out with you?"
The big green face with the shock of black hair had looked back over his shoulder at her, contemplating her for a moment before he let it fall at his feet.
"I told him the people in the lab were safe. That he hadn't hurt anyone except for the bad guys who hurt them. That he did a good job."
She smiled at the memory of the normally sullen mouth twitching into something like a grin. Although she hadn't been sure in the glow of the mountain sunset, she thought his cheeks might have been tinged with pink.
"What did he do?" Bruce asked.
"He shook my hand. Kind of."
Bruce goggled. "What? You…you let him touch you?"
"It was more like he let me touch him."
She'd touched the underside of his wrist, stroking the pulse point, feeling the kettle drum beat of it decelerate as his green eyes held hers steadily. She'd thought a little of Bruce's familiar brown filtering through, until she said, "Bruce likes that, too."
The Big Guy really did not like mentions of Bruce, apparently, because he'd scowled and stamped off. Bizarrely, he reminded her of Clint's kids when Laura told them it was bedtime, and they insisted they were not sleepy and not going to bed. She'd watched him from a distance, a silhouette kicking rocks around, until inevitably he wore himself out and changed back.
"I think we can get you back, Bruce."
"We?"
"I want to be plan A."
His mouth opened and closed, mutely. She thought he would argue, even refuse outright. When he finally got a word out it was only to ask, "Why?"
"Do you think Fury welcomed me to SHIELD after my prior work for the KGB and as a mercenary without having a fail-safe?" Natasha replied. "That's what Phil Coulson was for me." And Melinda May. Trusted agents, who wouldn't shrink from doing what was necessary should Clint's hunch about her turn out to be misplaced. It hadn't, of course, and eventually they'd been able to have drinks together at the end of a hard day, commiserating over Stark babysitting duty.
"And Barton was your Plan A?" Bruce asked.
"You catch on fast, Banner. You a genius or something?"
He laughed softly, catching his lower lip between his teeth as he cut his eyes up toward her.
"I haven't agreed to anything yet, but I'm open to the idea."
"Why don't we go find a diner and talk about it over coffee and pie?" Natasha suggested.
Bruce glanced at his watch. "Actually, it's time for breakfast. I know a place with great cinnamon rolls."
As they left the park, the Manhattan skyline was aglow with the rising sun.