After Bruce gets those words out, silence envelopes the room.

Natasha is giving him the most pitied smile of the year, but Tony just stares at a spot on the wall a few feet away.

Some time later - as time is now moving through pudding - Bruce figures he should say something else, but then the engineer abruptly leaves, clipping his shoulder on the doorframe. Bruce listens to the pad of his feet echo, then die down.

The silence continues, until Natasha asks one simple question. "Why?"

Bruce has to stop himself from laughing. What a naïve thing to ask a suicidal person. He figures that at some point, Natasha would've felt this way too. Hasn't everyone in their line of work? But he supposes that he's a bit of an odd case.

To mimic the simple question, the physicist gives a simple response. "I'm a monster."

The answer resonates around the room like a steel drum in an amphitheatre.

The spy opens her mouth to either comfort or disagree, but Bruce stops her. He's tired of lies, and Natasha is known for exactly that. "Please leave," He states, voice confident, unlike his usual unsure and anxious tone.

Natasha pauses, just for a second, but then gracefully exits, feet making no noise on the path to the elevator.

Bruce takes a deep breath of extra oxygenated air, and settles into the comfortable bed. Still though, he can't mask the excitement of inevitable death. He hasn't felt this way since the accident, or even farther back, when he swears he swallowed enough pills.

He sighs contentedly with the knowledge that this time is it.

Tony goes down to the destroyed lab and destroys it 'a bit' more.

He's eternally thankful he moved Dum-E up to the new lab. He wouldn't want his beloved bot to see this, or even risk him getting hit.

Panels are smashed, sheets are broken, tools are thrown, and he's ninety percent sure he sprained his ankle when he stood atop a weak piece of desk.

Tired of the lab, Tony climbs into his suit, as easily as putting on his shirt in the morning. He mutes Friday, and flies to the liquor store as fast as he can possibly go.

It's a private liquor store. When the owner sees Iron Man land, Tony's sure his eyes are actually going to pop out of their sockets via springs, like on the cartoons.

He pulls out a bundle of 100 dollar bills that he keeps with him precisely for moments like this, and shoves them in the owner's face. "I'm quite sure this will suffice." He says, and the owner nods - still probably in shock - and precipitously leaves his store.

Tony doesn't bother getting himself out of the suit, he just flips the face plate and grabs the closest bottle. It's a peach Matilda, and Tony fucking hates it, because he prefers the straightest, blandest, and purest alcohol.

Somehow though, it's the best thing Tony's ever tasted.

Because it's alcohol, dammit, and sobriety never ended well with him.

Disturbing his silence, Friday overrules his mute and yaps at him to stop, and how she's authorized to tell someone, and call Dr. Reeves, and Tony begins to hate himself for putting in all of these protective protocols, because he doesn't want them, he just wants to sit and drink in peace like he could when he was a kid. The genius' thoughts spiral worse than they have in quite some time, but Tony can't bring himself to care.

To fix Friday's warnings, the engineer takes off the entire head off of his suit and throws it against a wall of liquor. He pushes down the urge to lap of the alcohol form the broken bottles like a starved dog to water.

He gets through a few more bottles, but half of it dribbles down his chin and he's nowhere close to being drunk like he wants to be. Mutely, Tony hopes that Friday didn't tell anyone of his current predicament. He'd really just like to drink by himself. Unfortunately, he doubts that's the case, given the fact that Colonel Rhodes nearly kicks down the door.

Tony's first thought, Fucking yeah, he's strong enough to kick, is quickly replaced by, Shit, I'm in trouble.

The thought definitely doesn't disappear when Rhodes announces, "You are a fucking moron. And you should thank the lords that my mama isn't here to chastise you."

As per usual, curiosity gets the better of the good doctor.

He wants to know what's happening with his body.

He wants to know who figured out how to harm him.

He wants to know how they figured out how to harm him.

He wants to know how long he has until… Well, yeah.

He wants to know all of the answers.

First thing's first though, Bruce has got to get rid of the oxygen mask. So he tentatively takes it off of his face, happy that he doesn't get dizzy or lightheaded. He then completely sits up, and tests his lungs with a few deep breaths. All seems in order, which is a bit worrying. Probably even more worrying than if he still couldn't breathe.

Because now, there's uncertainty. And if there's one thing Bruce hates (other than himself), it's uncertainty.

"Doctor Banner, although your vitals appear normal for the time being, I cannot support you taking off your oxygen mask." Friday says, voice making Bruce flinch a bit.

"Well," Bruce starts, "Then don't support it," The scientist is sure that if Friday had a face, it would look disapproving. "Who's in the building?"

"Miss Romanov." Friday answers, somehow letting the oxygen slide.

Bruce raises his eyebrows in the lack of people in the giant tower, but doesn't say anything about it. Something tells him that he'd rather not know what Tony's up to.

"Where is she?"

"She is currently in the gym, on floor thirty six."

"Thanks," Bruce says, taking off to the direction of the elevator.

As he steps in, Friday asks, "Would you like to be taken to her?"

The man ponders it for a second or two, but decides, "No, that's alright. Take me to the new lab."

"Sure." Friday answers, and for a moment there Bruce could've sworn that Friday sounded disappointed. Nevertheless, she still moves the elevator up to the fortieth floor, where the new lab lays.

Bruce mutters a "Thanks," and hastily grabs a centrifuge, along with a few radiation proof vials (courtesy of Stark), a syringe and needle, and finally a tourniquet.

It's time to get to work.

Bruce spends the next few hours oblivious to the world.

After a few minutes of working, he easily falls into the routine he's been doing all of his life. It's easy for him. Science, biology, it's all been his strong suit, even when he was a little boy.

At some point, part of his brain asks him why Tony or someone else hasn't checked up on him or anything, but he pushes that thought from his mind to make room for hypotheses. Not even Friday has bothered him.

Although at some point he realizes that Dum-E's been tapping out the lyrics to "Be a Man" from Mulan, which he'd have to ask about later.

After hours of work, Bruce figures out a few things.

One: The reason why he is being poisoned, or why he is the only one that's sick, is because the virus attaches itself onto cells that have been affected by radiation poisoning. So obviously, this person, or group of people, know what they're doing. He figures that if they're smart enough to develop a virus like this, they're also smart enough to develop a virus to attack cells affected by the super soldier serum.

Two: Bruce is almost certain that the virus is mutating inside of his body, thus changing the symptoms as times goes on. Because of this, he has no way to prepare for the future or protect anyone around him.

Three: The Hulk may be affected by this virus differently than Bruce is. The scientist believes this because of two reasons. One of them being that if he was making a virus to keep away Hulk (not like he has haha, nope, not at all) he would make lethargic symptoms. Due to the fact that Hulk was able to nearly shatter the Hulk-proof glass when Tony was in trouble, he doubts that Hulk is less powerful. If anything, he may be more powerful. The second reason is that Hulk is his own "person". So just by the nature of the virus, it wouldn't affect him the same way it's affecting the biologist.

Bruce takes a step back and admires the work of this virus.

The scientist wonders if in a different life he'd be colleagues with these people.

Bruce waits out a bout of nausea and dizziness, and then continues testing his research. At some point Dum-E urgently chirps at him and holds out a smoothing that looks absolutely revolting. He's pretty sure motor oil is one of the ingredients.

Nevertheless, Bruce takes it and sets it to the side of his work. The bot seems satisfied.

After Dum-E whirs away, Bruce is stuck standing at the two microscopes he set out. After finding these discoveries out, he wants to do what he does best: Run.

Run away from the Tower, where people that care about him live.

Run away from New York, where happy families and people go about their day.

Run away from America, where Thaddeus Ross is always looking for him, and always has the upperhand on him.

Run away from North America where Tony would easily be able to track him.

Run away from any adjacent continents where SHIELD could simply send agents and a threat to bring him in.

Run away from anywhere where people live, because he gets attached. That's always been and will be his biggest flaw.

He meets someone that he inevitably starts caring for, and then he ends up hurting them.

Somehow, no matter how hard he tries the small scientist ends up hurting everyone he ever cared about. Ever since he was ten- No, no, he's not going to get into that anymore.

Which leaves him with only one way to run away: From Earth.

And due to the fact that he doesn't have a spaceship that he can use to go to a planet light years away where Hulk would be appreciated*, he's left with one other way to run.

With a handy dandy gun with a handy dandy bullet.

'Course, he may have to be a bit more creative with the methods of death, seeing as how the whole bullet-in-the-mouth technique didn't exactly work as planned.

Maybe he'll engineer a few special powerful pills that'll even kill the Hulk. Maybe cyanide? There's some other fun poisons out there as well. Perhaps bleach? Anthrax? Strychnine? Arsenic? Ricin? Maybe a combination of everything?

His last big feat could be finding a way to kill the monster that's killed so many others. Maybe he'd even be awarded something posthumously.

Doctor Banner's final experiment: To find a way to kill himself. He could imagine the look on Ross' face when he was the one to kill himself.

Bruce's thoughts are interrupted when he's hit with another dizzy spell. After he recovers, he figures he should probably be recording his symptoms. That'd probably for the best, if he's going to either cure himself, or kill himself.

He glances at the clock and sucks a quick breath in. When had it gotten that late?

It has been four hours since he's fled to the lab, and no one - not even Friday - had interrupted him.

"Friday, where is everyone?"

As if waiting for this exact question, the AI answers, "Boss and Doctor Reeves are currently in a session on the fourteenth floor, Miss Romanov is working out in the gym on the thirty sixth floor, Colonel Rhodes is conversing with his family over the phone, and Miss Potts is currently on her way back to the Tower."

Bruce analyzes the answer for a moment before asking, "Why's Pepper coming back?"

"She believed that it would be most helpful if she was in the Tower to help." Friday answers, voice crisp and collected as always.

"Oh. Why?" Bruce ponders.

There's a pause before Friday answers, "I believe you'll have to ask Boss that himself."

As if he was shot, anxiety spikes through the doctor, and he has to remind himself to take a few deep breaths.

While attempting to take normal breaths, dizziness takes over Bruce yet again, which is really just the greatest of timings. At this point, the scientist figures he should probably check his ears or something.

With white knuckles, Bruce grips the countertop near his work and pretends that the world isn't spinning. He waits ten seconds, but he still can't focus on something without it turning upside down and back again. Dum-E chirps at him, and Friday inquires, but Bruce can't exactly answer as he falls to the floor, eyes closing.

Across the numerous floors of the Tower, Friday interrupts Tony's emergency session, where he's currently attempting to ignore all of the problems in his life, much to Doctor Reeves distaste.

"Boss," Friday starts, and Tony could throw a party at the interruption. "I hate to disturb your session, but Doctor Banner seems to have fallen ill in the new lab,"

She barely gets the sentence out before Tony jumps up sends a dangerous glare at Reeves as if it's her fault. "Need more info than that, Fri," Tony mutters, panic and worry etched onto his words.

"Doctor Banner was working for the past six hours, and his blood sugar as well as blood pressure has been steadily dropping."

Even though Friday would've continued, Tony stops her there. "Fri, I'm changing your protocols. When something like that happens, especially because of whatever the fuck is going on with Brucie, you tell me. 'Kay? Good."

"Of course, Boss. But I would recommend going to Doctor Banner at the moment, rather than updating-" Friday gets cut off yet again by her creator.

"Already going, girlie." With that, Tony heads to his new lab, leaving Doctor Reeves by herself, but not without varying degrees of problems with her clients.

When Tony makes his way to the lab, he tries to ignore the vial of blood that Bruce hasn't used yet. He tries really, really, hard. But at the moment, there are more pressing matters. Like the fact that his robot is spinning in worried circles around his friend.

"Bruce? Bruce!" He calls, sliding to his knees as quickly as he can. "Friday- vitals, now!"

"Doctor Banner's blood pressure has already leveled itself out, and his respiratory system is functioning at normal standards."

Snarling at no one in particular Tony asks, "Then why the fuck is he laying on the ground!" Surprising him, the yelling seems to have stirred up Bruce, as if he was simply sleeping. "Bruce?"

An annoyed, "Nngh," Is all he gets in response, but it sounds like music to his ears.

"Bruce, hey, I need you to open up your eyes, big guy,"

A few moments pass, and the smaller scientist cracks his eyes open. Only to close them again, because holy shit those lights are bright. He opens them again, and asks, "Wh't happen'?"

Looking the other way on the slur of words, Tony answers, "You fainted in the lab,"

"How l'ng?"

"Only a few minutes," The engineer answers, and helps his friend sit up.

Bruce mutters, "Oh," And then looks up at the counter full of his work. "Oh," He says again, as if remembering what he was doing.

Tony also looks up at the countertop and bites his lip so he doesn't start yelling. "You wanna tell me why there's drops of blood on the specimen stage of my microscopes? And another vial of it waiting patiently?" He helps his friend stand up.

To reply, Bruce just murmurs, "Mm, dn't touch. 'S dangerous."

"Not exactly answering my question, bud." Bruce just gives a slow blink of his eyes, so Tony takes it into his own hands.

Making sure that the scientist won't tip over when he moves, Tony walks on his knees to the other side of his friend and pushes up the sleeve up to reveal a small band-aid on the crook of his elbow.

He gives a sigh and asks, "Brucie, why'd you take your blood?"

"Gotta figure out wh'ts wrong with me," Bruce answers, with full conviction.

"So you decided to draw your own blood?"

The biologist simply nods, and then lazily leans against Tony, energy drained. The two stand there for a few seconds, before Bruce's eyes shoot wide open and stare at Tony. "Fr-Friday said that, er, said that, you were with Doctor, Doctor Reeves," He doesn't pose it as a question, but Tony knows that's what it is.

All stamina disappeared, Bruce starts to sink to the floor, and Tony goes with him, attempting to control the fall.

He sighs and rubs a hand at his eyes. "Uh yeah. About that,"

"Wh't happen'?"

Tony frowns at Bruce still slurring his words but answers none the less. "Well, you know how well sobriety has gone in the past?"

Bruce's eyes go wide and pushes his head away from Tony's shoulder to give a disappointed look. "Wh't you do?"

"I drank a liquor store."

"Mm?"

"I bought a liquor store, or maybe just for the day, you know, we never really got through the semantics of it all-" Tony cuts himself off to get to the point, "Anyhow, I drank."

Evidently too tired, Bruce slumps against the other scientist and asks, "How m'ch?"

Tony scoffs and says, "Not enough,"

Bruce doesn't say anything in response, but both of the men know that the silence tells a story itself.

A minute or two pass, and when Bruce's eyes flutter shut (Tony hopes to God that he's just tired, nothing else), the engineer announces, "Alright, big guy, we're getting you back to the med bay,"

"'M not wheezing," The physicist counters, drawing out 'wheeze' for a few extra seconds.

With an eye roll, Tony just mutters, "Your symptoms appear so fucking fast, I'm not taking any chances."

Bruce giggles and starts humming ABBA's Take a Chance On Me, and Tony tries not to worry. But as soon as he gets the scientist upright, Bruce starts to pull on Tony's sleeve.

Panic in his eyes, Bruce tells Tony, "M'croscope. Check it,"

The engineer drags Bruce to the elevator and promises, "Later,"

Still, Bruce repeats, "Ch'ck it. 'S import'nt."

Knowing that the other man won't be satisfied until he does, Tony drapes the biologist over the couch in the lab, and heads to the microscope.

Now, Tony's no expert in biology, but he knows what blood cells are supposed to look like. And he's ninety-nine percent sure that they aren't supposed to have little dots of blue hanging off of them. He recognizes the difference from radiation, but he knows that the dots aren't supposed to be there.

"What the fuck?" He softly asks the air. "Friday, nobody goes in this lab unless I know about it, kapish? And if anyone gets near these blood samples, tase them."

"Of course, Boss." Friday calmly answers from a speaker to his left.

Tony quickly gets back to his friend and helps him stand up. As they shuffle into the elevator, the cataloging of symptoms (courtesy of the engineer) is halted by Bruce asking, "'Ou didn't t'ch it, right?"

The taller man shakes his head. "Nope, didn't touch it."

"G'd," Says, evidently satisfied. "'M poison's. D'nt w'nt you to get s'ck."

The billionaire fondly shakes his head and says, "You're not poisonous, Bruce. You're not," He adds, just for good measure.

Bruce doesn't reply to that, or even make any move that he heard the response. Tony tries to shrug it off, but he can't get it out of his brain.

God, he needs a drink.

Just as the elevator is stopping at the med bay floor - thanks to Friday who brought them there without request - Bruce confusedly looks up at Tony and asks, "Why 'r we here?"

Without missing a beat Tony answers, "Because I need to keep you safe."

"Oh."

As they stumble down the hallway to the room Bruce was previously in, he asks, "Wh'ts that?"

Tony sends a worrying glance toward the smaller man's curls and replies, "What's what?"

"That." Bruce says, making absolutely no indication to what he could be talking about. No nod in a direction, no pointing fingers, nothing.

The physicist continues to head to the room, as if he said nothing. Somewhere along the twenty foot hall he starts leaning against the wall as well as Tony.

As the genius sets Bruce down on the bed, he frowns at his friend's habit of biting his tongue, but doesn't comment on it.

"Boss, I believe-"

Tony cuts Friday out of his mind as everything ties together in slow motion.

As the doctor jets a leg out of the covers Tony realizes that all of these symptoms go together, and their final form is not exactly ideal.

"Fuck. Fuck!" He says, and immediately grabs an extra pillow and puts it between his friend's head and the wall.

Powerless, he watches in horror as Bruce's arms and legs each take their sweet time, seizing up. Some severe, some just twitching or suddenly tightening.

If Tony didn't know better, it would seem that out of the blue Friday announces, "The seizure has evolved from tonic seizure to a myoclonic seizure, time: One minute and thirty-four seconds.

"Get-" He chokes on the word, and tries again, "Get Natasha."

"Of course." Friday answers, and Tony continues to watch as Bruce's muscles involuntarily jerk.

At some point he swears that Bruce murmurs his name, but part of Tony believes that he just imagined it.

Natasha nearly runs into the room, and her Black Widow mask falls for just a second as she takes in Bruce. "How long?"

Friday easily supplies, "Three minutes and forty-six seconds."

Ten seconds later, Bruce stills.

"Oh thank fuck." Tony mutters, while collapsing to the floor.

Natasha quickly grabs him under his arms and hauls him to the nearest comfy chair. "You need food," She tells the engineer, and then pulls her attention to the other scientist. "Bruce?" She quietly asks.

To reply, he makes a noncommittal noise and then promptly vomits to his right side, away from the spy. Or, he would've vomit if he had any food in his stomach.

Natasha gives a disappointed look at his dry heaving and sighs, "You also need to eat."

Behind Natasha, Tony softly glares at Bruce and warns, "Don't you ever do that again."

The small man looks confused for a moment, until he swallows and asks, "Did I have a seizure?"

Confirming his suspicions, Tony asks, "How'd you know?"

Bruce ducks behind his curls and says, "I was sort of conscious. I think?"

Tony shakes his head and yells out, "Fuck!" He turns to slam his fist into the wall, but Natasha sees it coming a mile away and easily pulls his arm back.

"Stark." She warns, and Tony sends her a dirty look.

He then looks straight at Bruce and says, "You better stay fucking healthy from now on. I can't deal with this fucking shit anymore."

"Tony," Bruce starts, but gets cut off.

"No, you know what? No. Just no." Tony gives an angry breath and continues, "I can't- I fucking can't deal with any more shit. But that doesn't mean you should run off back to India because you think that that'll help my problems, you hear me?"

"Tony-"

"No running away to other countries, 'kay? You're safest here, and we'll figure every little thing out. Two geniuses, right? We'll figure it out. Just," He waves a hand in the general direction of his friend and mutters, "stay here. Don't leave. Not now. I can't fucking- fucking deal with someone else I care about leaving."

With that, the billionaire exits the room, leaving Natasha and Bruce.

Bruce sits up in the bed and looks at Natasha, because he's not really quite sure what just happened.

The spy purses her lips together in pity and sadly notes, "Oh, Bruce. I never wanted this for you." She fondly shakes her head. "I never thought bringing you in for Loki would've made people target you."

Although the pity is certainly there, Bruce doesn't believe her. So he shakes his head and looks straight into her eyes. He then takes a deep breath and says, "Yes, yes you did. You knew what you were bringing me into."

"Bruce," She starts, but doesn't really know where she's going with it.

The scientist shakes his head to show is disinterest and brings his legs up to his chest.

Natasha gets the que, and leaves the room, knowing that Friday will keep an eye on the poor man. She pretends that it doesn't feel like earlier today, when Bruce confessed his urge to end his life.

She goes the end of the hallway, out of earshot of Bruce, and dials the most important number to her.

It rings twice and a half before the other end picks up, and she doesn't waste any time. "Clint."

"'Tasha?"

"Did you find the other Avengers?"

She can almost hear Clint nod on the other end. "Yeah. All but Wanda, who's apparently out with Vision or something."

"Did you tell them about the people after their powers?"

Clint snorts, "Yeah. Cap said something about how he'd protect them. He and Bucky, anyway."

"Mm." Natasha answers, wishing she could talk to her partner in crime face to face.

"Sometime tells me this wasn't a courtesy call?"

She sighs and admits, "One of them already got to Bruce."

"What? He's with Stark?"

"Yeah. I can't believe we missed that."

Clint cuts right to the chase. "Is he okay?"

Natasha lets her hair fall over her face and gives a sad snort.

"Tasha?"

"It's bad, Clint. Worse than we thought."

A/N Y'all if you want an extra happy experience on this story go head over to Ao3 (same title and everything) mmkay yeh love you guys