Hey, it's Wednesday! And also the day I take my spanish final, but I'm not too worried about that. Anyway...

Jayc Black"D'aww" is right!

MysticRyter: I'm very glad those were tears of joy. I would've felt bad if I was making you sad.

garnet86: Thank you very much! I was worried about the pacing of their relationship because I've read far too many fics in all sorts of fandoms where people fall in love far too fast.

Itsgoose2u: Thank you! Oh, and for Loki's plans...you'll find out soon enough (muahahaha)

DarkRulerKida: Haha, that's great to hear!

miller330: Thank you!

yesiamweird: Thanks! I'm glad you like the fluffy-ness!

AngelVamp6688: Haha, I have an addiction too. I'm going for the third time on my birthday this Sunday. And thank you! I would probably end up "kissing his face off" myself haha.

Chapter Sixteen

The following day Gwen made her way to the labs where she knew Bruce would be waiting for her. She wasn't quite sure how they were going to do this whole "practice" thing, but she thought she might as well give it a shot. At least it would keep Fury from putting her under arrest.

She found Bruce in the labs and was surprised that Tony was not there with him. She figured he must've gone back to Stark Tower to check up on everything.

Bruce looked up at her as she stood in the doorway and knocked on the doorframe to alert her prescence.

"Oh, hi Gwendolyn," greeted Bruce. "Just give me second."

He grabbed his glasses after sliding a finger on a monitor and watching it for a second. After becoming pleased with what was on the screen, he came over to her.

"I thought we might want to do this somewhere else. Just in case."

Gwen nodded, understanding, and followed him as he led her to the medical ward and then into a room off of that.

It seemed as though it were like a room in which an individual would go in for a check-up. Except instead of the large chair that could be controlled to go up and down, there was a table that went up to her hips. There was several counterspaces that were already filled up with equipment that Gwen assumed Bruce put there.

"Sit on the table, please," ordered Bruce. Gwen did as he said and jumped up on the table, her hands holding the edge.

"So how are we going to do this?" she asked as Bruce put on his glasses and grabbed some equipment.

"Well, for today, we're going to see how this shield affects your body," he answered, coming over to her with some wires. "I'm going to put these on you so I can monitor your heartbeat, brain activity, all that stuff."

He placed two wires on her chest and two wires on her head, one on each side.

"But Doctor, I don't know how to, well, use my 'power'," Gwen stated.

"You'll have to try," he answered as he returned to the devices the wires led to.

"It sounds silly," continued Gwen. "I mean, me having a 'power.' I sound like I'm part of the X-Men or something."

Bruce laughed. "I suppose it does sound like that. Now, before we begin, I'm just going to ask you a few questions."

Gwen nodded.

"Has anything odd occured around you recently? Maybe like lights flickering, batteries suddenly losing all power...?"

"No," answered Gwen.

"What did your parents do when you were very young?"

Gwen was surprised with this random question, but she assumed he was simply trying to understand how she had this "shield" in her head seeing as she had it all of her life. What her parents' jobs had to do with it, she didn't know.

"My dad was a computer programmer and my mom stayed at home with me," she answered.

"Did you mother have a job before your were born?"

"I don't know...Doctor, what does this have to do with anything?"

"I believe that it is possible that your mother could have encountered some sort of radiation or gamma rays or something while she was pregnant with you."

Gwen nodded uncertainly. She was pretty sure that didn't happen, but then again, she wouldn't know. It was possible.

"So, are you going to help me control energy or something?" she asked.

"Not really," answered Bruce.

"What?"

"The thing is, I think I was wrong. You don't control energy."

Gwen shook her head. "Then how do you explain everything?"

Bruce turned to her. "It's that shield. That's your X-Men mutant power. It takes in things that it tries to keep out."

"So, the tesseract. It's taken that energy in?"

"Like I said, I think that it's making you stronger."

After a deep breath Gwen nodded. "Then what are we doing?"

"First I'm going to have you take energy."

"Uh, what?"

Bruce came over to her holding out a cheap looking phone. "If I'm correct, you'll be able to take the energy out of the phone battery. Sort of like what people say ghosts do. They take energy from cameras, phones and other devices so that they can manifest themselves. I think you might be able to do the same thing, but instead you use it for your own energy."

"So basically I could run on batteries."

"Essencially, yes."

Gwen took the phone in her hand and stared at it. "What am I supposed to do?"

"I'm not quite sure," answered Bruce. "I suppose you could just concentrate. Focus on the battery. If it might help, you can take the back off so you can touch the battery directly."

Unsure of what to do still, Gwen took off the back of the phone and put her other hand on the battery.

Nothing happened.

She had thought she'd feel something or at least see sparks, but nothing happened. The battery just sat there and Gwen thought she looked sort of silly just sitting there with her hand on it.

"It's not working," stated Gwen.

"I wasn't sure if it would," admitted Bruce. "Try focusing on the shield."

"I don't know how."

"Just try. Once you expand it, that might lead you to manipulate the energy around you. You've got to creat an opening for the extra energy to get in."

Gwen closed her eyes this time and concentrated on her head. She couldn't feel the shield, but she tried the best she could. She placed her hand back on the battery and heard a zap.

"Ouch!" she exclaimed as she pulled her hand away instinctively.

Bruce was smiling as he took the phone away. "That was great!"

"How was that great?" asked Gwen, rubbing her hand. "It shocked me."

"There were some sparks," answered Bruce. "I think with more practice you'll eventually get there."

Bruce looked over the monitors, specifically the ones that showed a scan of her brain. Gwen got a look, too, and saw what she assumed was the shield around her brain moving around. There was a very small hole in it, but it was only there for a few seconds before it closed up and Gwen lost all concentration on it.

"I'd say we're done for today," said Bruce. "I don't want you doing too much right away."

He took off all the wires that he had placed on her and returned them to their respective devices.

"Are we doing this again tomorrow?" asked Gwen as she hopped down from the table."

"Yeah. For the time in between, I suggest you try practicing a bit on your own. Nothing big though. Just try to take the energy out of batteries like we did today."

"Sure thing, Doctor."

Bruce smiled. "You're free to leave."

After one last nod, Gwen opened the door and quickly left the medical ward, heading straight for the gym.

Gwen found Steve in the gym like she had the time before Loki had taken her. He was once again using the punching bags, though he certainly didn't look as violent as the first time she saw him. It was almost like he was doing this for fun.

"Hey, Steve," she said casually.

He turned around quickly with a large grin on his face. "Gwen, hi."

Gwen walked over to a random chair that was sitting there and sat down. Steve started unwrapping the tape on his hands.

"Are you done with Doctor Banner for today?" he asked.

"Yeah, he had me try to take the energy out of a phone battery."

Steve squinted his eyes in confusion, so Gwen thought it would be best to change the subject. Even if she didn't really want to talk about it.

"Were you telling the truth when you said I'm not a monster?" she asked softly, looking at her feet.

"Of course," answered Steve confidently. "Why would you be?"

"I hurt peope, Steve."

"Did you do it on purpose?"

"Well, no, but I wanted to hurt Agent Maxwell."

"Gwen, that wasn't the real Agent Maxwell. That was Loki."

"I didn't know that at the time. I wanted to hurt someone that I thought was innocent!"

Steve looked over at her and she finally looked up.

"Gwen," said Steve, "what he said was out of line."

"He was provoking me. I should've known better."

"Loki's nothing but a bully with super powers. I don't stand for bullies."

Gwen couldn't help but smile at him and found herself staring at him a bit too long, even after he went back to unwrapping the tape. Embarressed, she quickly looked at her feet again.

"I honestly can't imagine bullies giving you a problem," she said.

Steve laughed. "You didn't know me before the procedure."

"If only those bullies could see you now, huh?"

"I bet some of them can."

Gwen paused for a moment as she realized that everyone Steve once knew was either dead or incredibly old. She couldn't imagine what that felt like, so she didn't press the subject.

Instead, she attempted to explain what she meant by taking energy out of a phone battery.

Tony sighed as he ran a hand over his face. Bruce was working with Gwen and Tony wasn't into the idea of being the labs alone just in case Mr. Grumpy, aka Fury, decided to show up. So the genius decided to stay at Stark Tower in order to try and locate Loki and the tesseract.

Unfortunately, he was alone here too as Pepper had gone to a meeting with a Senator.

"Sir," came JARVIS's voice, "there are a group of men in the lobby that are demanding your presence."

"Show me the security feed."

Tony looked up at a monitor to see about a dozen men wearing police uniforms standing in his lobby. He certainly didn't like how they had their guns drawn.

"Alright," said Tony. "I'll go down."

Tony entered the elevator and let JARVIS take him down. He was slightly, just slightly, worried. He knew why they were there and had been waiting for it to happen. He just hoped the plan he constructed would work.

The elevator doors slid open and the policemen raised their weapons at him. Tony put his hands in the air almost on instinct as he walked to a specific spot.

"Hey, there's no need to point those at me," he said.

"Tony Stark," said the policeman in the front. "You under arrest for the murders of Charles Johnson, Alan Shilling and James Thorn."

"Yeah," answered Tony. "That's gonna be a problem."

"We don't want to have to hurt you, Mr. Stark," said the policeman.

"It's not really me that's the problem necessarily. Y'see, I didn't kill those guys. I mean, why would I? There's no motive."

"Mr. Stark-"

"Oh, don't worry. I've watched all those crime shows and whatnot. I just don't see how you've come to the conclusion I'm murdering innocent people."

"You have the right to remain silent-"

"Yeah, I don't think so. JARVIS! Activate Plan 'They're-Not-Gonna-Take-Me-Dead-Or-Alive.'"

Just as the policemen started to comprehend what he just said, smoke started shooting out of the walls where they stood. The men fell down on the ground for air while Tony allowed the Iron Man suit to wrap around him where he stood.

Once this was all done, Tony shot through the front doors, destroying them in the process.

Although Tony didn't want it to come to this, he knew he couldn't go back to Stark Tower. The police would probably get a warrant and shut the place down or at least search it.

"Would you like me to call Miss Potts for you, sir?" asked JARVIS as Tony flew off for the helicarrier.

"Yeah, might be a good idea."

Pepper's face came up in front of him as her phone rang. She picked up after two rings.

"Tony?" she asked.

"Hey there," he answered casually.

"Tony, what's going on? There are so many sirens!"

"Yeah, uh, y'see, I just resisted arrest and blew smoke into the faces of twelve cops."

"Tony you what?"

"Trust me, I'm thinking the same thing. I bet they'll let you back in the tower, but I don't think I'll be able to get back in."

"You have some explaining to do when this is over."

Tony smiled. "That I do, Pepper. That I do."