PURPLE IS A SHITTY COLOR
TRYING TO LEARN THE NAMES OF EVERY COLOR IN FIVE MINUTES IS EXHAUSTING. That’s not even mentioning Olivia’s headache, which definitely isn’t getting any better. Still, she finds satisfaction and gratification in knowing that the first color she saw was blue.
She knows blue— she’s heard of blue. The sky is blue, she grew up with that nailed into her head. The ocean is blue, too; she thinks that Loki’s eyes are closer to sky blue than ocean, though. In pictures, at the least.
Seeing colors now, Olivia wants to know them all. She’s struck with the urge to see every shade of blue and red and green, and every other color she’s always heard about but never known.
So, even though her head is killing her, she stands and makes her way to the lab. Maybe she’ll finally find out what color Bruce’s shirt is. That would be nice.
She arrives to complete pandemonium; the room is in the midst of an argument. Looking around, bewildered, she cuts off Tony in the middle of what looks like a threat, him getting in Captain America’s face.
“Woah, woah, woah! Hey!” she exclaims, catching the attention of the room. “What the fuck is going on in here?”
“He is using the Tesseract to make weapons,” Bruce states, pointing at Nick Fury. Olivia’s eyebrows shoot up, and she turns her gaze on him.
“Yeah? How’s that working out for you?” she prompts sarcastically.
“I’m sorry, who are you?” Steve interrupts, earning himself a stiff smile from Olivia, who notes that his eyes are blue, like Loki’s.
“Olivia Banner,” she introduces. “And who are you?” She points to the buff blonde holding a hammer. He crosses his arms.
“I am Thor, God of Thunder,” he states. She nods.
“Well now that we’re all introduced, in what world was using the alien energy source that you don’t understand to make weapons a good idea?” she asks Fury, arms crossed.
“Miss Banner, may I remind you that you are only here in case Dr. Banner has any accidents,” he states angrily. “You can be removed at any time.”
“Hey,” Bruce interjects, “do not talk to her that way.”
“Agent Romanoff, would you escort Dr. Banner back to his—?” Fury starts, only to be cut off by Bruce.
“Where?” he snaps. “You rented my room.” Fury tries to placate the man, glancing at the unhelpful Olivia.
“The cell was just in case—,” Fury starts, but Bruce talks over him.
“In case you needed to kill me, but you can’t. I know, I tried,” he states hotly. The room falls silent, most staring at him with their anger broken. He shifts, turning a little uncomfortable. “I got low. I didn’t see an end, so... I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out.” He glances at his sister, who is staring at the wall, her head pounding. “So I moved on. I focused on helping other people. I was good, until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk. You wanna know my secret, Agent Romanoff, you wanna know how I stay calm?”
“Bruce,” Olivia pipes up, her voice soft, stealing his attention. Fury and Natasha have their hands on their guns. “Put down the scepter.” With a small start, Bruce realizes he was holding Loki’s scepter. The gem at the end is glowing bright blue.
An alarm starts beeping, and Olivia closes her eyes, pressing a hand into the side of her head to try and alleviate some of her quickly developing migraine. The building argument isn’t really helpful, and there are a lot of bright colors in the room.
Bruce’s shirt, for instance; an ugly, garish color that Olivia thinks is called purple. She... does not like purple. At the very least, not this shade.
Opening her eyes again, she glances at the monitor into the room with Loki’s enclosure. That’s her soulmate. She was never naïve enough to believe that there was no chance she and her soulmate wouldn’t click, but...
This feels a little excessive.
Her thoughts that the next week is going to be really shitty are cut off by the universe taking time out of its day to prove her point.
That is to say, an explosion.
***
Olivia’s senses return in stages.
The first thing she registers is that she’s on the fucking floor. The second is that she split her lip and now there’s blood in her mouth.
She pushes herself up a bit with a soft groan; if she thought her headache was bad before...
Finally, she registers the sound of someone screaming. It’s her brother’s voice, but deeper, more animalistic. She looks up and, through blurry vision, recognizes a large figure that she thinks is green, hunched over.
It doesn’t take a genius to know who that is; but Olivia’s main concern is with Natasha Romanoff, who looks about ready to bolt.
“For... fuck’s sake,” Olivia groans, reaching up to grip a piece of rubble and hoist herself slowly to her feet.
The Hulk turns to look at Romanoff, and before Olivia can open her mouth to warn her against it, the redhead bolts.
The not-so-jolly green giant takes off after her, and Olivia releases a deep sigh before going after them. They aren’t hard to track; the roars and wake of destruction sort of give them away.
When she finally catches up to her brother, he’s in the middle of knocking Thor around.
“Hey!” she exclaims, catching his attention. “Bruce! Over here!” He drops Thor and practically runs over, grasping Olivia and lifting her up in one of his huge fists like a doll.
“MAD!” Hulk exclaims angrily. She nods, patting his hand lightly.
“Uh, yeah. I can see that,” she agrees. She winces, her shooting migraine and busted lip making talking hurt.
“GO!” He exclaims, pointing back the way she came angrily. She winces as he jostles her a little.
“Hey, hey, easy,” she scolds. “I just got blasted into the floor, I’m a little tender.” He blinks slowly, and then drops her point-blank onto the floor. She groans in pain. “For future reference, that is not what easy means.”
“SISTER HURT?!” Hulk exclaims angrily. “HURT SISTER, HULK SMASH!” She shakes her head, pushing herself back onto her feet.
“No, no, I’m not hurt,” she reassures him. “Not seriously, anyways— but you need to focus. Thor didn’t blow anything up, he’s not the bad guy. If you’re gonna smash someone, smash the bad guy.” Hulk takes a second to process this.
“NO! SMASH!” He exclaims childishly, throwing a chunk of rubble at Thor, who manages to roll out of the way in time.
“Hey, I’m trying to— look out!” Olivia exclaims, ducking for cover just as the bullets start. They’re as harmless as origami cranes to Hulk, but he recognizes his sister’s vulnerability and turns around to scream in rage.
He leaps off the building and onto the plane.
Olivia stands and watches as the plane explodes, sending her older brother plummeting to the ground below. She’s sure he’ll be fine, of course— he always is— but she wonders how many years it will be before he bothers to show up again.
A frown pulls at her face.
“Come on,” she sighs to Thor. “We’d better go find out what’s going on— you go that way, check the cage. I’ll go this way, look for any injured who might need a hand getting around.” He nods.
“Perhaps I judged you too hastily,” he hums thoughtfully. “You may impress me yet, Lady Banner.”
“I’m not even gonna try to unpack that,” Olivia sighs, starting her long walk through the Helicarrier.
Thor begins his own journey, with a destination in mind.