Chapter 21: Miles Away

The second time didn't work, either, not that anyone expected it to. Tony spent the entire time either laughing or crying, sometimes both at once. When it was over, no one spoke to him, and Tony couldn't tell if the silence was due to shame or good discipline. The nurse mutely peeled off his sensors, and then a pair of equally mute orderlies half-escorted, half-carried him back to his room. They shut the door behind him; Tony wondered if they'd locked him in, but not enough to check. Stumbling across the floor on his gelatinous legs, he collapsed into the bed, crawling naked under the covers. Law & Order was still playing on the television. How much time had passed since Hammer had first come into his room? Forty minutes, probably. An hour, tops. A lifetime.

Detective Lennie Briscoe delivered one of his blistering one liners, and Tony chuckled, less at the joke than at the profound absurdity of his life. He felt like one of those mid-western alien abductees, yanked right out of his plaid pajamas for an anal probe under the saucer lights and then back in bed again like nothing had happened. What had happened, exactly? According to Bruce, he should at least have gotten his dick back as a consolation prize, but he'd left with nothing. Okay, probably not nothing. Probably he'd left with some complicated new form of trauma. What a delight. Too bad he didn't have the energy to play with it right now; he'd have to tuck it away in the closet with all his other fun traumas, somewhere on the shelf between his post-Obie trust issues and the torture-induced PTSD.

There was a soft knock at his door. Bruce. No one else knocked around this goddamn place.

"Door's open," Tony called, unable to summon the will for a trek across the room, "unless it's not."

The knob turned, and Bruce came in, shutting the door behind him.

"They locked me in my room right before they came to get you. They just let me out again, or I would have come sooner," Bruce explained as he approached the bed, taking in Tony's naked shoulders peeking out from the top of the blankets, studying his tear-stained face. "Can I...can I ask you what happened?"

"Sure. The Barefoot Contessa had me over for cocktails and hors d'oeuvres." Bruce only frowned at the . Sighing, Tony turned his face to the ceiling. "They strapped me to an exam table and forced me to orgasm with a vibrator. Twice." His voice, he found, was totally expressionless.

"Oh my god," Bruce breathed.

"I brought it on myself. You were right about staying on Hammer's good side. If I hadn't been so fucking mouthy…" Tony trailed off, hearing Steve in his head:You keep pushing and pushing, right past any reasonable boundary. Is any of this good for you? Is any of this making you happy? Steve. Right, as usual, the asshole. Tony had no sense of self-preservation, and just look where it had gotten him now.

Glancing over at Bruce's stunned face, Tony tried to reassure him, "It's fine, Bruce. I'm fine. They didn't hurt me," he rationalized. "I wasn't even, you know, waterboarded or anything. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. This was nothing by comparison, a couple of rides on the merry-go-round."

"Tony—" Bruce's voice was soft with pity, and it filled Tony unexpectedly with rage.

"Don't," Tony spit. "I don't want your fucking feelings, Bruce. I'm bottling plenty of my own. I should open up my own bottling plant." Abruptly, he sat up in the bed, clutching the blankets against his naked chest. "What I want from you is an explanation. Why didn't it work?" he asked angrily, knowing full-well the emotion was woefully misdirected.

Bruce blew out his cheeks, "I don't know, Tony. I'm sure that's the answer." He chewed his thumb, thinking. "The only thing I can imagine is there was an insufficient amount of some hormone. If you weren't fully aroused…testosterone, maybe? Or maybe stress hormones interfered with the reaction. Or maybe it's neither of those. No way to know without seeing the data, but they haven't offered it to me."

"Bet they will," Tony snorted, "after they strike out a few more times."

"Maybe. I don't know. But...what can I do for you, Tony? Anything?"

"Yeah," Tony said, flopping back down to the bed, "you can shoot me, just shoot me, put me out of my misery. And after that, you can put in the next Law & Order DVD. I think I'm on disk 3."

From flat on his back, Tony watched Bruce obediently switch the disks and then plop into the armchair near the television. He shifted into the cushions, watching the title sequence, scratching absently at his anklet. It looked suspiciously like he was nesting, rather than perching casually for a minute or two before flying on.

"Excuse me," Tony asked irritably, "but what are you doing?"

"Uh, sitting?" Bruce replied, turning to look at Tony over his shoulder.

"Why?"

"I dunno, Tony. Because sometimes all you can do is sit. Unless…unless you want me to leave?"

There was a beat of silence; the title sequence played, ending with the infamous dun dun.

"No," said Tony, finally.

"Okay," Bruce nodded. "Thanks. In that case, can I have the remote? I like subtitles."

"You're pushing it, Bruce," Tony groused, tossing him the remote.

In the end, Steve was so jet-lagged that even caffeine and anxiety couldn't keep him awake, and he spent a few dreamless hours in a twin bed, propped up by practically every pillow in the house and some sofa cushions besides. When he woke, it was still dark, but he was too uncomfortable to go back to sleep. The house remained awfully cold, the old central heating system no match for the deep winter. He could feel the chill in his shoulder, making him stiff and achy. Pawing through his bag, he dug out the bottle of pain pills and then fought with his barely functioning fingers to pop the cap. He swallowed half a tablet, just enough (he hoped) to take the edge off for what he needed to do next. While he waited for the drugs to kick in, he dug around in his room's small desk, fishing out paper, envelopes, and a ballpoint. He wrote down the coordinates of the Bialowieza facility on three sheets of paper and then sealed them in separate envelopes, one addressed to Nat, one to Clint, and one to the .One job done.

For his second task, he crept down the narrow hallway to the tiny avocado-colored bathroom. He arranged his shaving kit neatly on the chipped Formica counter, then struggled out of the immobilizer. Slowly and carefully, he started to shave. Even raising his left hand to the level of his face took a mighty effort: the staples tugged at his tender skin as they moved with the stiff muscles in his shoulder. They were supposed to come out soon, today or maybe tomorrow. That was something to look forward to, at least. God knew there wasn't much else, unless he counted his duties as laid out in the directive. Some men, he knew, probably would.

When his face was smooth, Steve went back to his room, pulled out his uniform, and struggled into it. He was pretty sure no one in the history of mankind had ever taken so long to get their arm in a sleeve.

Once dressed, he regarded himself in the full-length mirror screwed to the back of the bedroom door. Steve wasn't sure exactly what he was looking for, Captain America, he supposed. Pulling himself up to his full height, he straightened his spine and squared his shoulders, taking up as much physical space as he could. He was an imposing man: at his size it was hard not to be, even with his arm held at an obviously tender angle. Good. Imposing was good; he wanted to be imposing, at least today.

But for all his formidable bulk, he also looked exhausted, with bags under his eyes and grim lines around his mouth, and he frowned at himself, dissatisfied. There was a certain fragility to his appearance he was unused to. Or, at least, a fragility he hadn't been used to in a very long time. But then, he was feeling pretty fragile: he was tapped out, physical and emotional resources depleted, with little hope for resupply. He was running on fumes. Sighing, he resigned himself to the fact that this was as close to Captain America as he was going to get, at least for the time being.

Weary of navel gazing, Steve went to the living room, intending to set a new fire, only to find Puppy awake and dressed, sipping coffee in front of a full blaze. Steve's step on the floorboard turned Puppy's head, then the sight of the uniform had him on his feet. He didn't actually salute, but Steve saw the instinct.

"At ease," Steve said drily, and underscored it by sitting heavily on the plaid couch. "Did you make the fire?"

"Yeah," Puppy said, easing back down.

"Looks good," Steve said, extending both his hands creakily toward the heat.

"Thanks. Had a good teacher." From the corner of his eye, Steve could see Puppy studying the uniform, as well as the lines on Steve's newly shaved face. "Where's the sling? You supposed to be out of it?"

Steve shrugged noncommittally, "Where's your partner?"

"Outside, checking out the sleds. It's snowing pretty hard out there. Supposed to stop in a few hours; we'll have to wait till then."

It wasn't what Steve wanted to hear, but he nodded; he couldn't ask them for more than they'd already done for him. Well, at least, not more than he was about to ask: "Listen," he said, pulling the three sealed envelopes out of a pocket, "I need you to do something for me." He held them towards Puppy. "All they need is postage. You could stick them in any mailbox back in the states; it would never get back to you."

Puppy hesitated, one finger tapping the side of his coffee mug. "What are they? Or don't I want to know?"

"Christmas cards."

"Uh huh." Puppy said, glancing over his shoulder, checking for his partner and possibly Uncle Sam, but when he found the coast was clear, he took the letters and folded them into an inner pocket of his jacket. "We'll be back in the city late tomorrow," he said, "but you know the postal service is always haywire during the holiday."

"Guess my cards might be late this year."

"Unless they get hand-delivered," Puppy mused.

"I would never ask you to do that."

"I know. And I won't make any promises about the one going to Iowa, but the two with addresses in the city, well," Puppy smiled, "they might make it in time."

"I don't know how to thank you."

"Hey," Puppy said modestly, waving the thanks away, "I'm just trying to get on the Nice List for once. That's hard to do in my line of work. Merry Christmas, Captain Rogers."

Bruce stayed all afternoon and into the night, falling asleep in the armchair sometime after midnight. Tony shook his shoulder and sent him to sleep in his own bed, then continued to half-watch Law & Order all night long, episode after episode. He was unbelievably tired, but his anxious thoughts wouldn't switch off long enough for him to fall asleep. What was going to happen to him? He didn't have enough data to even speculate, but that didn't stop his brain trying: it just kept spinning and spinning, like the little wheel of death on an overloaded computer.

The next morning, he didn't get out of bed. He couldn't think of a reason to. Law & Order played on and on, all five of his still operational brain cells soothed by the familiar sites of New York as they flitted by on screen.

Around 9, a man in fatigues that Tony recognized as the wine steward came to invite him to breakfast in Hammer's quarters.

"And if I say 'no'?" Tony asked the steward, not bothering to hide his disgust.

In reply, the man just lifted his eyebrows meaningfully and waited for Tony to change his mind. Tony got the picture: the invitation was actually an order.

He slouched after the steward to Chez Hammer where a resplendent breakfast was set, everything arrayed across the white table cloth in little silver dishes. Hammer was reading The New York Times and spreading a scone with about an inch of clotted cream. How could he eat like that and stay so trim? But then, nasty little rodents did have quick metabolisms.

"Tony!" Hammer said enthusiastically, gesturing to a chair with his cream-piled pastry. "Have a seat! What do you want? We have scones, sausages. Chef does a great omelet—"

"Coffee. Black coffee."

"Okay! Get my friend some joe," Hammer said, enthusiasm undimmed. "So," he continued brightly, "you probably slept pretty well, huh?" The wink wink, nudge nudge was heavily implied. Un-be-fucking-lievable.

The coffee appeared in a bone china mug with a gilded rim, and Tony wrapped his fingers around the warm cup, but didn't drink. Even lifting the mug seemed like too much effort. Through the curls of coffee-scented steam, Tony watched Hammer plow through his scone and then lick cream daintily off his . The sight made Tony want to heave. Suddenly past the point of exhaustion, Tony folded his arms on the table and buried his face in them.

"You alright there, Tony?"

No. No, he wasn't. It was the dumbest question Tony had ever heard. It made him want to scream his not-alright-ness in Hammer's face and then stab him with a piece of cutlery. Hammer more than deserved a fork to the kidney; Tony was just too tired and demoralized to manage it.

"What do you want?" Tony asked, still face down in his folded arms.

"I wanted to talk about the plan."

"What plan?"

"The plan for today. Look, yesterday was a set-back, I won't lie. We were pretty sure that was going to work, but hey, that's science on its bleeding edge, right? Anyway, we took a look at the data; pulled a pretty late night, actually, and now we have a new idea we'd like to try out this morning."

"So try it. It isn't like you need my permission. You made that clear." If they wanted to do something else terrible to him, Tony wanted them to go ahead and do it, as he had a pressing engagement with his DVD player. Law & Order wasn't going to watch itself.

Hammer chuckled, but there was a sharp edge to it. "You're right. I don't need your permission, but I'd like your cooperation. Surely, after yesterday, we agree that cooperation is in everyone's best interest."

Great. So they had already arrived at the threat portion of the meal, and Tony hadn't even touched his coffee yet. Lifting his head, Tony fixed Hammer with a dead-eyed stare.

"Good," Hammer said, taking Tony's raised head as agreement. He snapped his fingers over his shoulder, and the steward presented him with a thin binder which he slid across the table to Tony.

Sighing disinterestedly, Tony flipped it open to a random page. He was expecting charts and graphs, maybe some data tables. Instead, it was a man's headshot: fortyish, vaguely Richard Gere-ish, with very green eyes. Tony blinked at the picture, then he lifted his eyes and blinked again at Hammer.

"Who is this?" he asked blankly.

"You like him?" Hammer peered over the table at the picture. "Oh, yeah. He's hot. He should have an associated number in the bottom right hand corner of the page. Still, you should at least check out the other guys. There are some good ones in there. I know you like the blonds— "

"But who is it?"

"Well, I don't know his name, if that's what you're asking. Some CIA guy that works in S . Anyway, he volunteered. I know how much you like volunteers," Hammer said, flashing Tony with his outrageously white teeth.

And then, with dawning amazement, Tony understood.

"You can't be serious," Tony said with a laugh, slamming the binder shut. Once again, it was either laugh or cry. "I'm supposed to fuck one of these guys!?"

"Sure! It's a good-looking selection—"

"A good-looking selection? I'm not choosing a watchband, Hammer." Tony was disgusted.

"Please," Hammer scoffed. "That's basically how you used to pick girls, right?"

That brought Tony up short. Christ, Hammer was right about that at least. There had been a time when Tony's publicist would present him with a book of women's headshots, models and actresses and Playboy bunnies, all of them pre-screened and willing to be Tony's arm candy for whatever party or fundraiser he was attending. Christ, just thinking of it now made him mildly ill. He'd picked out dates like he'd picked out goofy electronics from SkyMall.

Karma, Tony reflected, was a real bitch.

"Come on, Tony," Hammer cajoled. "What's the big deal?"

"The big deal," Tony said, wishing he had his wedding band to wave in Hammer's face, "is that I am married." He really wanted to throw in a 'dipshit,' but he was determined to keep his mouth on the short leash this time.

"Yeah, but married doesn't mean dead, am I right? Tony, don't forget: I know you," Hammer insisted. "Back in the day, the longest you were ever monogamous was about half an hour. Look, I'm sure Rogers has a prenup, right? I know all about that. And you're right, it pays to be discreet, but you don't have to pretend with me. We both know you've got something on the side. I won't tell anybody—"

"Yes. Of course. Why pretend?" Tony agreed sarcastically, trying to wrench the car back into the right lane and away from his actual private life. "I've got a skirt back in Malibu that I see when I'm in California on business. Barely legal; the first time I fucked her, I checked her driver's license. Don't tell Steve; he'll take me to the cleaners."

Hammer, smirking, snagged another scone. "See? I knew it. Still, stepping out on Captain America…you're a brave man." The sarcasm, it seemed, had missed him entirely.

"That's me, the bravest man to ever bang a coed. Now why do I have to fuck one of these clowns?" he asked, holding up the binder.

"Mmmm, right," Hammer said around a mouthful of pastry, "so, it looks like masturbation alone produces an insufficient amount of prolactin for you to make the change. Get this, Tony: orgasms following vaginal sex result in prolactin levels four hundred times higher than orgasms from masturbation. I can give you the scholarship if you're interested." There was a glob of clotted cream caught at the corner of Hammer's mouth.

Tony rolled his eyes. "That's okay, Mr. Wizard. I believe you."

"Prolactin is the satiety chemical. Our working theory is that extragen won't exit your system until you've reached a certain level of, y'know, satisfaction."

"And you think one of these random guys is going to give it to me?" Tony made no effort to hide the fact that he thought Hammer was an idiot.

"Hope so. I mean, we vetted them best we could on short notice. We brought together all the guys with a high enough security clearance to know you exist and then asked for volunteers. Showed 'em the video of your little karaoke number; it wasn't a hard sell. Then we administered a multiple-choice female pleasure competency screener. Ones that passed the screener signed a written agreement stating they aren't allowed to ejaculate until after you've climaxed. Don't worry, we're ready with the little blue pills. You've got the top fifteen candidates right there."

"Multiple-choice female pleasure competency screener," Tony muttered, leafing through the binder. It was madness; Tony was through the looking glass. But for all its insanity, his situation was also terribly real and terribly serious: he was going to have sex with one of these guys. Today. He flipped back to the man with green eyes, trying to detect any obvious signs of psychopathy. But they were probably all psychopaths, right? Who volunteered for this kind of assignment? Not the Bruce Banners or Steve Rogerses of the world.

These men…these men were dangerous. These were the kind of men that had been told they were entitled to what they wanted and believed , look at this hot chick? Want to have sex with her? We've got her locked up in the back. Great! Sign the fuck were their moral qualms?

The fear that Tony had banished the previous afternoon had found its way back home, and he could feel the cold sweat in his armpits.I mean, he rationalized,they won't kill need me. But, Tony knew, there were a lot of terrifying possibilities between his current condition and actual death. He had to play this smart. Needing his brain firing on at least some cylinders, he slugged down his cup of coffee and then held it up for a refill. Buying time, he slowly turned through the binder, pages passing unseen before his eyes. He didn't want to be left alone with any of the men in the catalog, that was for damn sure, which meant he had two choices: Bruce or Hammer.

Bruce was obviously preferable in every way, and Tony already knew he was willing. But would they let him have sex with Bruce? Bruce, with his tendency to turn into a big, green manifestation of id, would add an additional variable to what was ostensibly a controlled experiment. If Tony were running the lab, Bruce would definitely get the veto. Which left just one: Hammer.

Shit.

Tony's stomach turned sour; for a second, he wanted to flip to a random headshot and declare a winner, but he fought the urge. Hammer had advantages. During their dubious encounter a decade ago, Hammer had given Tony a front row seat to some expert-level bedroom skills. Aside from the fact that he'd deliberately left Tony staring at a week's worth of bloody toilet paper, Hammer had been a good lay. Excellent, even. Doing the cold calculus, Tony knew that Hammer would probably get the job done. And he had a vested interest in success as project manager. But most importantly, Hammer probably wouldn't hurt him. At least, not too much. True, he was a despicable weasel, but he also was a known quantity. Overt violence wouldn't jibe with Hammer's vision of himself as a good guy. In Hammer's tender-ish care, Tony thought it unlikely he'd get choked or slapped around or out and out raped, not unless Tony made him really angry. But, Tony promised himself, he wouldn't make him angry. From this point forward, Tony was Miss Congeniality, gown and sash and all. Now he just had to talk Hammer into it.

The cold sweat was pooling under Tony's arms; a single icy trickle escaped his pit and rolled down his side. The timing for this was epically bad. Tony hadn't seen a mirror in a couple of days, and he suspected he looked about as bad as he felt. Ideally, he'd be about twenty times more groomed and twenty times less sweaty for a seduction, particularly one he absolutely could not afford to fuck up.

"So," Tony said casually, still leafing through the pictures, "what kinds of questions were on the competency screener?"

"Oh, mostly stuff about female anatomy, but there were also questions about intimate communication skills, a self-assessment of sexual ability, that kind of thing."

"How'd you score?" Tony slowly turned another page.

"Me?" Hammer chuckled smugly, "I mean, I didn't fill one out, but I'd probably score pretty well if I did. I helped write it."

"So why isn't your picture in here?" Slowly, Tony raised his eyes from the binder, willing them to be as big and bright and doe-like as possible. The big eyes had some kind of effect because Hammer stopped chewing. Maintaining the gaze, Tony licked a finger with a slow swipe of pink tongue before letting his eyes drop back to the binder. He used his spit-damp fingertip to turn the page.

There was a beat of silence; from the corner of Tony's eye, he could see Hammer considering him. His heart battered itself against his ribs, like some frantic little songbird trying to escape its cage because the cat had come calling.

"But you're pissed at me," Hammer said speculatively, clearly wondering about Tony's angle. "After yesterday, I mean. I really ticked you off. I don't think I've ever seen you so angry."

Shit. It was more self-awareness than Tony was anticipating, and it was inconvenient. Tony kept his eyes down, calculating. He could tell Hammer he wasn't angry, but that lie was so big, he'd choke to death on it. He'd have to spin some version of the truth, then.

"I am pissed," he admitted, lifting his gaze. "I am unbelievably pissed. But I am also unbelievably ready to get my dick back, and I don't want to waste my time with some douchebag and his self-reported skills."

Tony was barefoot, and, underneath the tablecloth, he slid his toes up Hammer's calf. When Hammer didn't pull away, he crept the foot between Hammer's thighs. Hammer was half-hard even before Tony touched him, his dick hot under Tony's cold toes. "With you," Tony said, letting his voice slide down an octave, "I've got hard data. You're a scientific certainty."

Clearing his throat, Hammer peered over his shoulder at the steward. Hey," he said, "why don't you go make a fresh pot of coffee?" Quietly, the steward made his way out of the room.

Hammer waited for the door to shut, then said, "So, what am I going to get out of this? I'll be honest, Tony, I don't know if I'm the guy. I'm supposed to be in charge. I'm not sure having sex with you would be, y'know, a professional look."

So Hammer wanted to play hard to get. Okay. Tony was ready for it. If he needed to beg, he told himself, he'd beg. If he needed to crawl under the table and stick Hammer's dick in his mouth, he'd do that, too. For the time being, he kept his foot moving along Hammer's dick, the toes gently curling around the stiffening shaft. He tried to isolate the foot in his mind, keep the action strictly mechanical. The movements of his toes, he told himself, had no bearing on his emotional state. His foot was just a foot, and whatever it did or didn't do had nothing to do with Tony.

"Claim you're taking a hands-on approach to the project;" Tony explained coolly, "it'll just show you want results. And you can say, in all honesty, that I requested you, seeing as we're old friends and all. You can write it up in a statement, asserting my full and enthusiastic consent. I'll sign it. Then you can point to it when some whistleblower inevitably leaks the records and the ACLU or whoever starts squawking about gross violations of my civil rights. Throw the CIA or army intelligence under the bus. They're the masterminds of all this. You did your best to protect and accommodate me under the circumstances; I'll give you the documentation to prove it."

"Full and enthusiastic consent," Hammer mused. His hand dropped absently into his lap, gently caressing Tony's small foot where it pressed into his erection.

Tony immediately wanted to jerk away, but he didn't. It's just a foot, he reminded himself, it's barely even my foot, more like a rent-a-foot. It's fine to abuse the rentals.

"How enthusiastic are we talking?" Hammer asked.

"Pom poms," Tony assured him, "cheerleading uniforms."

Hammer chuckled, "Well, I'd love to see that. Too bad we're fresh out of pleated skirts. However…" Hammer pushed back his chair and stood up, letting Tony's foot fall from his lap. Disappearing into his bedroom, he returned a minute later with a pair of green and gold Harrods bags and set them on the table.

"But I didn't get you anything," Tony deadpanned. He left the bags untouched, his palms suddenly itching with sweat.

"Aren't you going to open them?" Hammer was practically salivating.

"Who're they for? The Rockette?"

"Not anymore. Now, they're for you, Tony. Merry Christmas."