I can look out for myself."

"Maybe, but you shouldn't even still be here, Dr. Banner can analyze the staff on his own—"

"Oh, now you're eager to get me off the ship?" Tony snorted. "Half the time you can't keep your eyes off me, suddenly you want me gone?"

"I want you safe." Cap's jaw went tight. "You're a civilian."

"Is that what it is? You stare at all civilians until they get off your ship, Cap?"

"Just do what you came here to do." Was Tony imagining things, or was that the beginnings of a blush under Cap's hood? "Focus on the problem."

"You think I'm not? Why did Fury call us in, why now?" Tony demanded. "Why not before? What isn't he telling us? I can't do the equation unless I have all the variables."

"You think Fury's hiding something." Cap chuckled. "Why am I not surprised."

"He's a spy. Cap, he's the spy. His secrets have secrets." He opened a packet of blueberries he'd hidden onboard and popped a handful as he glanced at Bruce. "Buggin' him too, isn't it?"

"Uh…" Bruce froze. "I just wanna finish my work here, and—"

"Doctor?" Cap raised an eyebrow.

"A warm light for all mankind." Bruce sighed. "Loki's jab at Fury about the cube. I think that was meant to make us think."

"How so?"

"Well, SHIELD isn't typically interested in things like green energy, is it?" Bruce pointed out.

"I'm working on that." Tony nodded. "Once my decryption program finishes with the tesseract files, we'll know every dirty secret SHIELD has ever tried to hide. Blueberry?"

He extended the bag, meaning it more as a way to irritate Cap by being flip than to actually offer him food.

"Thank you." Cap took a handful anyway, with that same rueful, knowing sort of smile. "And you're confused about why they'd want to keep you out."

"An intelligenceanization that fears intelligence?" Tony swiped his bag back from Cap, annoyed that his attempt to irritate the guy hadn't even fazed him. "Historically, not awesome."

"Loki's just trying to wind us up." Cap shook his head, not taking the bait. "This is a man that means to start a war. If we don't stay focused, he'll seed. We have orders, we should follow them."

"Following's not really my style."

"That's for sure." Cap chuckled, which was definitely not the expected reaction. The more time Tony spent around this guy, the less he liked him. "Just find the cube, Tony."

Why was it always weapons?

Much as Steve wanted Tony off the ship as soon as possible, he'd been willing to admit Tony was right; there was definitely something fishy about SHIELD claiming to want the tesseract for green energy purposes. Hours seemed a long time to wait for the results of Tony's decryption though, so Steve had decided to see what he could dig up the old-fashioned way.

Which, of course, turned out to be weapons. Lots of them, and pretty damn similar to Hydra weapons at that. He carried one back with him as proof.

"What is phase two?" Tony demanded of Nick as Steve entered.

He tossed the weapon on the table, drawing everyone's attention; he took a moment to relish the surprise on Tony's face.

"Phase two is SHIELD uses the cube to make weapons." Steve glared at Nick, then with a hint of a smile in Tony's direction. "Sorry,puter was moving a little slow for me."

"Captain, we gathered everything related to the tesseract, this does not mean—"

"I'm sorry, Nick, what were you lying?" Tony twirled a screen around to show blueprints for the phase two weapons, the trademark SHIELD file stamp visible in the corner.

"Guess the world hasn't changed as much as I thought." Steve leveled the director with a look. It felt good to have Tony on his side for once, but that was far overshadowed by his disappointment in SHIELD.

Thor and Natasha entered, and Dr. Banner was the first to notice.

"Did you know about this?" he questioned Natasha.

"Do you want to think about removing yourself from this environment, Doctor?" Natasha was eyeing Bruce carefully, and Steve got the distinct impression she knew something they didn't. That wasn't unusual, but it seemed relevant.

"I was in Calcutta, I was pretty well removed."

"Loki is manipulating you." There it was.

"And you've been doing what, exactly?"

"You didn'te here because I bat my eyelashes at you—"

"Yes and I'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy." Dr. Banner stepped forward to direct her attention to the screen Tony had pulled up of phase two blueprints. Steve found his respect for Dr. Banner growing; for all his anxiety about authority, he seemed to have no trouble standing his ground when he chose to. "I'd like to know why SHIELD is using the tesseract to build weapons of mass destruction."

"Because of him." Nick pointed usingly at Thor. "Few months ago, earth had a visitor from another pl who had a grudge match that leveled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously, outgunned."

"My people want nothing but peace with your pl." Thor looked affronted.

"But you're not the only people out there, are you?" Nick demanded, "And you're not the only threat. The world's filling up with people who can't be matched. Iron Man's a perfect example. We've been after him for how long now, and we still can't touch the guy—"

"He helped us earlier—" Steve reminded Nick.

"But he can't be controlled." Nick just shook his head.

"Like you control the cube?" Steve challenged.

"Your work with the tesseract is what drew Loki to it, and his allies," Thor insisted, "It is a signal to all the realms that the earth is ready for a higher form of war."

"A higher form?"

"You forced our hand, we had toe up with—"

"A nuclear deterrent?" Tony snorted. "Because that always calms everything right down."

"Remind me again how you made your fortune, Stark?" Nick shot Tony a look, and Steve shot him a glare.

"Back off, he doesn't make weapons anymore—"

"Wait, hold on, what're you doing defending me?"

"I'm not defending, I'm clarifying—"

"No, you're defending, and I'm more than capable of doing that myself, thanks. I don't need your star-spangled ass always on mine, alright?"

It only got worse from there. It wasn't just him and Tony that began to argue either, but the entire team. Thor and Nick argued about control of the tesseract, Bruce and Natasha traded jabs about some watch list. At the mention of a threat watch, Tony snorted.

"You're on that list? Is that above or below angry bees?"

"One more crack, Tony, I swear—"

Part of it was that he felt hurt. Steve was self-aware enough to acknowledge that Tony's jabs were affecting him far more than they woulding from another SHIELD agent, or even another friend. But there was anger there too, dark and irrational and growing larger every second, fed by Steve's hurt at Tony's words and the miserable helplessness he felt about their future.

"Threat, verbal threat! I feel threatened."

"We're a time bomb." Bruce shook his head ruefully.

"You need to step away," Nick warned.

"Why shouldn't the guy let off a little steam?" Tony clasped a hand to his shoulder, but it was more jocular than affectionate.

"You know damn well why!" Steve snapped. There were thoughts he wanted to voice; because he could kill you. Because I need to keep you safe. Because I couldn't bear to lose you too. These thoughts, however, were discarded, overrun by the black anger bubbling up inside. He slapped Tony's hand away. "Back off!"

"Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me."

"Big man strutting around with his toys in a lab, what good's that going to do you when Loki's armyes?" Steve jabbed a finger in Tony's chest. "Nothing! You'll be exposed and vulnerable, and what if I'm not there? What if I lose sight of you for half a second and something happens? You think I can live with that, Tony? Because I can't!"

"What, I'm weak just because I'm not some big 'hero' like you?" Tony snarled, "You're a laboratory experiment, Captain. Everything special about you came out of a bottle."

Steve felt like he'd been punched in the gut by the Hulk, breathless and withouteback. Tony's words did more damage than Tony could've known, and for the briefest of moments, the anger lifted. It was just hurt left, hurt and the deep, almost irresistible desire to tell Tony who he was. To ask if he really thought that, not of Cap but of Steve.

Then Thor called them petty and tiny, and the group was distracted as Dr. Banner told them of the time the Hulk prevented his own suicide. He went on, daring them to ask how he stayed calm…as he picked up Loki's scepter. Theputer interrupted them before anything more could happen with a beep, having located the tesseract. Steve turned to ask Dr. Banner where the tesseract was, and in an instant they were all arguing again, which meant Steve never saw Tony slip out the door.

Tony stumbled into the hallway, rubbing blearily at his eyes. What was that? All the mild irritation he'd felt for Cap had suddenly surged into full-blown anger out of seemingly nowhere, and the others hadn't seemed in particularly good moods either. Could the scepter have been doing something to them? Tony scowled; fucking magic.

Tony opened the panel he'd hid the suit in with ease, planning to escape out the side and go after the tesseract himself. He could get there the fastest, after all, there was no reason to wait around for the Cap Squad to get their shit together. That plan was derailed, however, when an explosion rocked the Helicarrier. It seemed to havee from the lab he'd just been in, and in spite of their recent spat, Cap was an alright guy and Tony didn't want him dead or anything.

The HUD flicked online and Tony took off down the hall, reappearing in the lab. Bruce and Natasha had fallen through where the floor had broken apart, while Thor and Nick had been blasted backwards through the glass into another section. Only Cap remained in the room, and Tony bent to help him up.

"Hey, what happe—"

"Tony." Cap coughed. "Tony Stark."

Tony's heart sank somewhere into the pit of his stomach.

Just like that, it was o

本站無廣告，永久域名（fanyan.cc）