Shit. He shouldn't have guessed. He should've called SHIELD and double checked. Why hadn't he? Why in hell hadn't he? "Can-can you dismantle it?"

"I'm no Tony Stark, but he did give me some info. Lemme get back to you. For now, make sure Natasha has the codes." Clint reported.

Clint looked at the massive bulk of the weapon before him, and gulped. He should've taken notes or something. Seeing tools scattered at the edge of the room, he grabbed an electric screwdriver and got to work. Turn, shift…release the circular piece, that's what holds it together. Keep taking it apart until you get to the layer before the core.

Okay. He could do this. Keep Tony's voice in his head, and he could do this.

-

"You know, if you want to keep me awake, you should be more entertaining than just feeling me up," Tony muttered as Bruce checked his injuries.

The doctor arched an eyebrow, irritated. "Would you like to me to sing?"

"Oh, look! You made a funny!" Tony scoffed, trying to push away Bruce's hands from his chest. Bruce frowned suddenly as his hand brushed against the arc reactor.

"Have you ever had a doctor look into your base plate?"

"Nope. They're strictly ordered not to." Tony glared at Bruce. "I don't like people poking around in there. Too risky."

Ignoring Tony's comment, he continued to stare at it. "And how far in is it?"

"None of your business."

Bruce sighed. "I'm just concerned, is all. If its imbedded into your sternum, then that could cause problems if you keep breaking your damn ribs."

Steve wanted to punch himself. How could he have missed this and made this kind of mistake? He knew he was distracted and thinking of Tony, but now he just felt horrible. "Hawkeye-"

"Quiet," Clint muttered, his voice quivering slightly. He wanted to be able to focus, considering he was handling a damn nuke. God. What was it Tony had said about this? He glanced to the tool in his hands and gulped, before going back to work.

"Captain," Natasha said over the comm, "what's going on?"

-

"You don't have to worry about it," Tony muttered with a shake of the head. "Not to mention, its none of your-"

"I'm just trying to help."

"I can handle it," Tony ground out, a glare directed at Bruce.

The doctor sighed. "Right. Handle it," he muttered. "Because your methods of handling things are just so effective."

Steve hesitated answering, biting his lip. Swallowing hard, he said quietly, "There's a nuke in here."

"What?!" Natasha's voice went from calm to furious in a split second. "Captain, its YOUR responsibility to check these things!"

"I know. I'm sorry. I-"

"Is Clint dismantling it?"

"Yes, but-"

"You listen to me, Cap. For the rest of this mission, you better pay attention and keep it together or I will make sure that you will be stuck in a conference room for the next three days explaining to Fury himself that you were so wrapped up in your emotions you could have caused a nuclear explosion!" It was then Steve was reminded that Natasha was a first class assassin that took no shit.

"Almost got it," Clint grunted through the comm. "I think we're going to get lucky on this one."

-

"My handling of things are very efficient. Ask anyone."

"If I asked your husband, he'd disagree." Bruce said hotly, moving on to examine his fractured wrist. "When was the last time you took a shower? You look like shit."

"Thanks, doctor." Tony mumbled, closing his eyes. As soon as he did so, whatever energy that had kept him talking left and he could hardly fine the strength to open them again per Bruce's request.

"You're 5 minutes short, but I doubt you're going to last that long. Here." the doctor handed him two red pills and he swallowed them. "Have fun in dreamland."

As Tony succumbed to the darkness, he found himself praying silently that this medication wouldn't trigger any nightmares...

"Look," Steve started, "I just-"

"Got it." Clint said through the comm, sounding extremely relieved. He leaned back and tossed the tool in his hands aside, letting out a long breath as it clattered to the floor. "Damn good thing, too. It was set to blow in, like, two minutes."

There was a small sound of annoyance coming from Natasha's end, and for a moment, Steve expected her to start yelling at him again. Thankfully, she didn't. "Alright," her voice sounded eerily calm, like she was forcing herself not to snap. "Good work, Barton."

Bruce watched with a frown as Tony promptly fell asleep, and he let out a long, frustrated sigh. "Bastard thinks he can handle everything..." he glanced towards Happy then. "So how bad was he when you found him? Where'd you find him anyways, a bar? Steve was so worried he could hardly take a breath to really explain it to me." He shook his head. The captain had been rambling so fast that Bruce had only caught little snippets of information before he finally got him to calm down so that they could call Fury.

"The threat has been detained, dear Captain. Don't let this fault you." Thor told him assuredly, and Steve was grateful that at least someone wasn't going to be furious at him. He doubted anyone else would be too pleased with him for the next few days. S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel will be giving him death glares until a novice agent screws up. He swears that its not unlike high school when it comes to the agents.

Natasha was noticeably silent. He knew that despite her support with the situation with Tony, she was still a professional at her line of work and mistakes like Steve's were not tolerable in her book.

"Well, base is cleared, codes are retrieved, nuclear bomb is dismantled...I think we did okay." Clint said weakly. He sounded a bit shaken behind his relief. "I want to get out of here."

"S.H.I.E.L.D. will bring in some experts anyway. We can go now." He could barely contain his enthusiasm. There was no need to stay in Japan, they'd be free to go home. Home is where Tony was. So as they called up the helicarrier and stood in the base courtyard waiting, he ignored Natasha's glares and Clint's disappointed looks. A small helicopter landed near them and they boarded it, Clint giving the officials a brief description of the dismantled nuke.

When they landed on the carrier, Steve was about to exit when Natasha grabbed his arm and steered him away into where the quinjets were. "There is a ship waiting for you and Clint. I will stay here and explain to Fury what happened. Now get the hell out of here before I change my mind."

"Nat, you don't have to-"

"Steve," her eyes burned into his, "shut up and go."

Steve wasn't exactly sure if he should be grateful for the gesture or frightened for when he encountered Natasha and Fury later.

-

Happy shrugged, plopping down in a seat next to Tony's bedside. "I'm no doctor, Doc, but he didn't look good. He was hacking a lung out and a fever was already growing."

"That's expected. Did he say anything to you at all?"

"Ah, well, you know Tony. Always a happy drunk," Happy smiled fondly before thinking for a second. "However now that I think about it, he was rambling a lot in the car ride home. Kept asking for Pepper, and then Steve, like he was confused who he really should be asking for. Which is weird. If Tony didn't remember Steve at all, why would he be asking for him?"

Bruce frowned slightly. Why would he, indeed? Both he and Happy knew very well that Tony didn't just ask for help unless the person was very close to him. It was clear that Tony doesn't feel the way he did about Steve before the accident. Though Happy did mentioned that Tony was barely lucid, if at all.

"Maybe his subconscious is remembering his bond with Steve," his eyes widened. "He may not be aware consciously what Steve means to him, but..."

"I know nothing about that." Happy said, smirking. "I don't think I ever been in love. Anyway, I better go tell Pepper what happened. I bet she's worried about him."

"Tell her I said hello and not to worry about Tony; we'll make sure he's okay."

Happy waved goodbye and left, leaving Bruce with a sleeping Tony. He looked at his face and noticed that the various cuts and bruises were fading, but his face was scrunched up in discomfort. "You never make things easy, do you, Stark?" he sighed.

But who was he kidding, he was just ready to go home right now. Steve was ready to see Tony with his own two eyes and truly see if he was okay, even if he knew the genius might be annoyed by his presence. It hurt a bit when he thought about Tony's obvious distaste for Steve hovering so much, but he told himself to just ignore that. Things would... they would go back to normal, right?

He bit his lip. Hopefully, he thought as he headed off, throwing one last glance over his shoulder in Natasha's direction.

Bruce rubbed at his forehead as he let his mind drift and he thought of the team, wondering if everything was going according to plan. Something just told him it wasn't- because, honestly, when did it ever with them?- and he sighed. Not like he could do anything from here, really.

"No..."

A mumble interrupted him and he glanced back to Tony, who's face was still scrunched with discomfort. His head rolled to the side slightly and he noticed the corner of his mouth twitch, down into a frown.

Ah. He was dreaming, apparently.

Bruce wringed his hands in his lap, watching Tony's face carefully. He didn't want to wake the recovering billionaire up; if he did, he may not want to sleep at all and demand that he go in his lab to work.

Just stay calm, Tony...he pleaded silently.

His hopes went unheard. Tony gasped slightly, sweat starting to bead down on his face. He seemed to want to turn, but his ribs obviously stopped that, from his cry of pain. "No...Yinsen!"

Hesitantly, he picked up the phone and decided to call Steve. Maybe he had any tricks to help Tony with his nightmares without waking him up.

-

Steve had just boarded the quinjet and changed out of his uniform into a t-shirt and jeans and flopped down into a chair. Clint was humming from the cockpit, probably congratulating himself on a job well done.

He was about to say something when his phone rang. He fumbled it out of his pocket and saw from the Caller ID said "Bruce". Frowning slightly, he answered it. "Bruce? Is Tony okay?" he immediately asked.

"Well, he was fine. He fell asleep not that long ago. Now it looks like he's having a nightmare."

Steve swallowed a little. "How bad?"

"Sweating, attempting to toss and turn, and I think its getting worse. Any ideas on how to calm him down without waking him up? Knowing Tony, he's not going to want to rest again after he has a dream like this."

Steve closed his eyes for a moment, wishing that he could be there himself to comfort Tony right now. He guessed he would just have to deal with it, since he didn't really have any other option, but he didn't particularly like it. "Uhm, well, stroke his hair. That usually helps," he said, thinking. "And tell him he's okay, that he's safe..." He listened for a moment, wincing as he heard Tony whimper through the phone. Oh, yeah, it was going to be a bad one. He could tell and... dammit, why couldn't they be back at the tower already?!

"Bruce? Is it helping at all?"

"A little, I guess...who's Yinsen?" Bruce asked.

Steve winced. Tony must be dreaming about his time in Afghanistan. That's not good. Those dreams were the worst. Often times, usually when Tony was sick, he'd forget where he was, locked in the throes of his nightmare, yelling for Yinsen, the doctor who saved his life and died saving it a second time. "Bruce, tell him he's not in Afghanistan."

"What?"

"Just...tell him. Make sure he knows where he is."

"You think he's dreaming about the cave?"

"I know he is."

Steve pinched the bridge of his nose as he could calmly hear Bruce talking to Tony. He let out a breath, hoping it was helping. "Anything?"

"It's helping some, but he's still saying it..." Bruce frowned. He didn't know what to do now- this was something Steve was use to dealing with. Not him.

"Um, hold his hand. And keep petting his hair. And.." Steve tried to think of something else for the doctor to do, but he just grew more frustrated. Why couldn't he be there, dammit?

Tony flinched violently at Bruce's touch suddenly, his arms lashing out- where had Tony's sling gone? He wasn't supposed to take it off- Bruce barely dodged an incoming fist to his face, and he sat down the phone on the floor, ignoring Steve's cries of "Bruce? Bruce?"

Bruce gripped Tony's shoulders, trying to hold the man down so that he wouldn't injure himself further. Already he could see that the pain in moving was taking its toll on Tony, from the way he shuddered. "Tony, its okay. You're in New York...not in Afghanistan! Calm down!"

Steve felt utterly helpless as he listened. "Bruce?" he tried again, wishing the doctor would answer him.

Bruce cursed under his breath as he watched Tony still try to struggle against his grasp. "Hey," he said gently. "You're fine. You're at the Tower, in your room, you-"

"No!" The billionaire cried weakly, trembling as he made a feeble attempt to jerk away from Bruce. "No..."

Steve listened, realizing it sounded like Tony was finally calming down. He let out a relieved breath, though he froze when he heard what came out of Tony's mouth next.

"Steve? Where's Steve?"