Hill flipped through the pages, making the already thin folder appear even smaller. “Not much of a starting point,” she said.
Nick leaned back in his chair. “No,” he agreed. The report from Stark’s A.I. was very brief, and the rest was just what the scavenging team managed to comb through from the quinjet debris. “The press will not be satisfied with that. And there is a key part missing. We deliver this to the Council, they laugh in our faces.”
Hill raised an eyebrow at him. “So our job is to make the folder thicker?”
“Our job is to understand what happened,” he replied. “So we can deliver them something slightly more coherent, and they can feed the reporters whatever they want.”
“And you think this will work?” Hill gestured to the room around them. Across the desk where she was sitting, on a perfect diagonal view from Nick’s eye, there was a single, empty chair. “Seems like a criminal interrogation.”
“Maybe it is,” Nick said. He wasn’t sure if the superficial report was an intentional cover up or just plain sloppiness – both were equally likely when you had people like Romanoff or Stark in the middle of an OP – but at the end of the day, it didn’t matter. There was a hole in the story, and the World Security Council didn’t deal with holes. “Look, I’m not thrilled by the prospect of spending my day here either, but there’s no postponing this. We can’t give them a chance to combine stories.”
“Right,” Hill said. “And I’m sure they’ll all be very… cooperative.”
“Hope you didn’t have any dinner plans,” Nick quipped.
Hill’s sigh mirrored his own so much it was unnerving. “Okay.” She leaned forward and pressed a button on his desk. “Send in the first one.”
“There isn’t much to tell,” Romanoff said, and, if Nick wasn’t sure there was something being hidden before, now he did. “I believe JARVIS sent you a detailed account, didn’t he?”
“Depending on what you consider ‘detailed,’” Nick replied. The report had extensively covered the material damage to the quinjet, as well as the information pertaining to AIM’s plan and how it related to it. It was just lacking in the “explanations” department, and it seemed to jump in key time periods between events very hurriedly. Either Stark’s robot was a shit storyteller, or the human factor (specifically the “what the fuck were your team of freaks thinking to let something like this happen, director?” factor) had been strategically avoided.
And there was the matter of the tapes. The security footage recovered from AIM’s quinjet seemed to cover just about every angle of the battle - that is, up until a point right where everything just faded to static before it returned just in time to record the crash.
“This is standard procedure,” he continued as Romanoff’s eyes studied him attentively. “Which, I’d like to stress, is actually a kind way to go about it.” Romanoff quirked an eyebrow at him. “The Avengers initiative isn’t the most popular plan SHIELD has ever come up with, agent. To the world, you might be celebrities, but a lot of people on the inside see you as - how did Banner put it? Oh, yeah - a time-bomb.”
Romanoff smiled. “We’ve made it work so far.”
“Only barely,” Nick said. Romanoff didn’t deny it, nor could she - ever since they had all decided to stay at Stark’s tower, after the battle of New York, Nick had kept his eye close on their performances, be it on the field or with the press, and though the initial animosity seemed to have lessened, they were still a far cry from a synchronized, united team.
The Council had been against them moving in together - there was just too much potential for the proximity to make things go south again - but Nick had argued in favor, and they ultimately decided to allow it. Nick himself knew he was making a risky bet, but at the end of the day, he figured a bunch of anti social people on the edge of normal society had a better chance of making it as a team if they could at least learn how to deal with each other on a friendly basis. And Stark putting the damn A on the tower was as close as he’d ever get to admitting he wanted the company, so Nick didn’t want to deny him it. Hill had a laugh at his expense, then, saying he was getting old and soft.
None of them knew about any of this, of course, and they would never find out. But if Nick Fury made a bet, he wanted to ensure it’d pay off, and crashing a quinjet belonging to one the world’s largest weapons manufacturers in the middle of rural property of the some of the richest people in America was far from a reward, especially while keeping potentially vital bits of information in the dark. That wouldn’t do, and he was determined to get the full picture of what had gone down, whether they liked or not.
“Why don’t you start at the beginning, agent?” Hill suggested.
Romanoff’s eyes blinked astutely before she smiled. “Of course,” she said, much more kindly than Nick would have anticipated. “It started at the fair.”
“I wouldn’t normally have come,” Dr. Banner said, straightening his glasses. “The events we get invited to, they're… not my usual scene.”
“Too many reporters?” Nick asked. He knew Banner wasn’t the press’ favorite target - Stark and Rogers, both recipients of huge celebrity fame way before anyone added superhero worship into the mix, were tied up for that position - but he also knew the Avengers in general were the go-to topic for any gossip show running out of material. The fascination with them pendulumed from healthy curiosity to obsessive speculation way too often for Nick’s liking.
“Too many people,” Banner said, with a nervous smile. “The other guy doesn’t like crowds. But AIM said they were interested in having me and Tony speak. ‘The science bros.’” He made air quotes. “Or something. And, well, it was a nice idea to hang on a science exposition. I looked through the flier, and there were some interesting exhibits.”
“The whole thing was just a blatant rip off of the Stark Expo. But you know how it goes – imitation, flattery, yadda yadda.” Stark leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on the desk as if it was his office. “So, we get the invite, and, not going to lie, I was a little curious. Pep said we should make an appearance, smile a little, make niceties – but, well, you know me.”
Nick raised an eyebrow, unimpressed by the display. “We do?”
Stark smiled. “I don’t like to do things halfway. I’m just not built for it.” He shrugged. “So I decided to come, and I thought it would be good if everyone else came too, and that we should try out some of the exhibits together – team bonding, you know? Sometimes it’s nice.”
“Stark wanted to show off,” Barton said, taking a sip of his water. “He thought there was no way Hammer’s people could organize something on that scale, and he wanted to drag us all there to see it because he was sure it would end up being a huge mess.” He sighed. “I guess at the end of the day, he wasn’t wrong.”
Rogers’ jaw clenched so hard Nick thought he’d pull a muscle. “Everything went normally. We got there, took some pictures, got inside… Nothing out of the ordinary.” He looked at Hill. “But, like I said, this is all in JARVIS’ report.”
“Right,” Nick replied. He tilted his head to get a better look. Rogers was as tense as a wood board, and his effort to not let it show made things a lot worse. “I have to say, Cap, I was a little surprised to not get the usual report coming from you.”
Rogers shifted on the chair. “Tony—” He cleared his throat. “We, uh, we thought JARVIS would make one more quickly.” His eyes turned towards Fury, defiant. “From what I understand, every piece of information the Council needs should be in that file.”
“Need and want are two very different things,” Nick said. Rogers took a deep breath, and Nick couldn’t help but frown. “So, you guys started to mingle, right?” he asked, wanting things to get back on track. “That was when you decided to go to Hammer’s stand?”
“Yes. He… invited us.” He paused. “Well, Tony, at least.”
“Right,” Nick said. “But you also ended up going, right?” Rogers gave a reluctant nod. “Why?”
There was a moment of silence, and Rogers said, “It seemed like it could be an interesting experience.”
“Stark dared him to do it,” Thor stated bluntly. “Said Steven was probably too scared to lose to him.” He smiled, amused. Nick was fighting against the urge to underestimate him, but boy, was it hard. “It reminded me of some of my disputes with my brother, when we were both younglings and daring ourselves to attempt to steal Heimdall’s helmet.”
“Well, that’s a nice thing to hear about two adults who are constantly in charge of saving the world,” Nick deadpanned.
Thor looked at him disapprovingly. “They are worthy warriors,” he said. “They just… get a little wrapped up in their blind spots, sometimes.” Nick and Hill stared at him questioningly, and Thor looked away, coughing on his hand. “Uh, well, where was I? Right – the stand.”
“It was a silly concept – melt stuff with our new laser project, whoever melts the most wins, woohoo! - but I’ll admit it seemed like it could be fun. It took place in a separate room, though, and they were only letting two people in at once.” Stark straightened his tie, looking away from Nick for the first time since he walked inside the office. “So me and Cap decided to try it out.”
“Why just the two of you?” Hill asked, precise as a whip.
Stark stayed focused on his tie. “Well, I wanted to check out what was so great that Hammer was showing off in public. As for Cap, who knows? You should probably ask him.”
“So it was a spontaneous thing?” Nick pushed. “You didn’t ask him to come along?”
Finally, Stark looked at him. For a second, his expression was downright defiant. Then it all melted away in a shrug. “I might’ve. I wasn’t driving back home, you know? So I had a few drinks, and I was saying a lot of things, and maybe I asked if he wanted to try it out.”
“We heard you dared him,” Nick countered. Normally he wouldn’t put the cards on the table like that, but something in Stark seemed to favor a more direct approach.
Stark’s expression didn’t change. “Again, I might’ve. What’s life without a little challenge, right? But, still, if you want to know why he came in the stand, you should probably ask him.” His eyes darted towards the window, avoiding Nick and Hill. “Maybe he just… needed a distraction. He hates those things.” Nick tilted his head, noticing the strange thoughtfulness in his voice, but as soon as it came it was gone, and Stark was rambling at rapid fire speed again. “Anyway, I suppose this is where I get to the gas, right?”
Hill turned a page of the folder. “This is where the truth serum got them, right?”
Barton gave them a lopsided smile. “Stark would blow a fuse if he heard you calling it that,” he said. “But, yeah. Exactly.”
“The definition itself started an argument.” Natasha sipped her water from a straw. “Steve said it was a truth serum, and Tony said it couldn’t be, because the very idea of a truth serum is based on warped pseudo-science that only makes sense in movies. He got very intense about it – apparently, pop culture’s obsession with the concept is somewhat of a sore spot in the scientific community. Odd skepticism to have with a literal alien who shoots lightning on your team, but--” She shrugged with one shoulder. “It’s a thing, I guess.”
“Look,” Banner gestured as if he was in the middle of a lecture in a university. “The thing is that the truth is a philosophical, completely subjective concept. It’s… it’s cultural, it’s human-made. Sure, when someone is telling the truth or not, there are certain telltale signs that can, sometimes, be read on a physical level, but”--he inhaled deeply--“it’s all very superficial, and it’s controllable. I mean, there’s a reason there are entire books out there teaching people how to fool a polygraph. There isn’t, like, a gland in your brain that can be stimulated to make you unable to lie. So a mind-altering drug that forces someone to always tell the truth isn’t just implausible – it’s absurd. Frankly, it’s ridiculous.” His voice grew a little winded. “It’s on the same level as claiming you invented a love potion.”
Fury nodded slowly at his words, while Hill proceeded. “But that was the effect of Hammer’s gas, right?”
Banner’s face twisted with displeasure. “Well—yes.” He massaged his temples. “But it wasn’t a truth serum. Not—not like the ones in the movies.” The massage continued. “Let’s just agree on that, okay?”
Fury leaned further on his chair. “Then what, in your professional opinion, Doctor, was it?”
“To be honest”--Romanoff tilted her head, her expression unwavering--“I’m not sure. Not even Hammer seemed to know, in the end. Tony and Bruce ran a thousand tests, but…” She let her sentence die, her lips pursing slightly as she shook her head. “Nope. Nothing.”
“It was magic,” Thor said, as casually as if he was saying the sky was blue.
Nick and Hill looked at each other.
“The report didn’t mention that.”
Thor grinned. “Yeah. I find that you humans tend to get a little… what’s the word?” He paused, then raised his hand and made a shivering motion. “Skittish where magic is concerned. Stark did tell JARVIS to include a recommendation for further investigation and inquire of those AIM fellows, to find out who their friends are.” His eyes landed on Nick. “Which is what I’m planning to do, you know--once you’re done wasting my time.”
“So it could be just unknown tech,” Hill said. “You don’t have proof that it was magic.”
Thor chuckled. “See what I mean? Skittish. No, I don’t have any proof, which is why it is not in your report.” He raised his hand and his hammer flew from the other side of the room, making both of them jump. He regarded them with amusement. “But I know it when I see it.”
Nick’s eye found Hill’s again, and he hummed noncommittally.
Nick watched as Rogers’ hand curled into a fist in his lap.
“No,” he replied. “Everything felt normal when we left the stand.” His leg was shaking, and he added, “How much longer is this going to take?”
“Somewhere you need to be at, Captain?” Nick asked. A slight flush colored Rogers’ cheeks, and Nick added, a little kinder: “Not much longer, I promise.”
“A little bit,” Stark said. “Immediately after we got out, it did seem like the words were just leaving my mouth without a second thought.”
Hill looked at him, unimpressed. “That was a change?”
Stark made a finger gun at her. “Touché.” He smiled. “It felt a little like being drunk. And, in response to what you’re thinking – yes, that’s probably why I didn’t think anything was wrong.”
Barton took a paperweight in his hand and started twirling it with his fingers. “To be honest with you, it was a little bit of a mood whiplash. They came out of the stand seeming to be having a great time, talking and laughing. Bruce was dying to call it a night, so we started walking towards the exit, and…” He moved his fingers to twirl the paperweight in the opposite direction. “Boom. I wasn’t next to them, I don’t know what Cap said, but by the time we got to the car, Stark was on full-on dick mode, snapping at everybody.” He paused. “He looked a little like a kicked puppy.”
“Tony was talking about the expo. Mentioned it was actually nice.” Romanoff lowered her mug on the table. “And then Steve said ‘much better than the Stark expo,’ emphasis and everything. I think Tony was upset.”
“I wasn’t feeling very well,” Banner said. “I think it was the place. It was smaller than the last expo we went to.”
“That was the last Stark Expo, right?”
“Yeah. That one was great. I managed to stay longer, had a nice time.” He smiled slightly at the memory. “The other guy was quiet, the food was good… I even had a great discussion about bioscience with Pepper. She wasn’t at this one, though.”
“Stark brought his ex to his expo?” Nick asked.
“They weren’t broken up back then,” Banner said, then made a face. “Well, I guess they were, but they were getting back together. It was kind of a honeymoon phase - they were, well, all over each other. Tony thanked her when he took the mic and everything. Seemed like they were back together for good.”
“Back to the Hammer expo,” Hill said, trying to steer the conversation before it got too off-track. “You said you wanted to leave early?”
“Uh, yeah, I asked Nat and she told everyone we should get going. At the Hammer expo, I mean.”
“Right,” Hill said. “And Stark and Cap argued on the way to the car?”
“Apparently, yeah. But I wasn’t paying attention, so I didn’t hear what they were talking about.”
“Was that when you realized something was wrong?” Hill asked.
Rogers pressed his lips together in a thin line. “Not really,” he admitted. “I thought I had just... put my foot in my mouth. That happens sometimes when I’m with—Uh, sometimes.” He inhaled deeply. “Then I tried to say I didn’t mean it, but I choked, even though I didn’t mean it, not in the way he took it. I-- I didn’t mean to discredit the work of the Stark Expo, it was just, uh. A matter of personal experience.” He crossed his arms. “But, no, it didn’t occur to me I was under the effect of anything. I choked once, then Tony got in the car and he clearly didn’t want to talk anymore, so I didn’t push it.”
Nick stopped to consider just how much bullshit he wanted to call out at once, then said, “Were you afraid you’d end up talking too much?” Rogers widened his eyes, and, because nobody could say Nick wasn’t a merciful man, he added, “And offending him?”
Rogers blinked. “Oh. Yeah,” he said, slowly. “That… that was what I was afraid of.”
“I realized something was off after I got to my workshop. JARVIS asked me how the night went, and I—well, I couldn’t answer it.” Stark shrugged. “So I started running tests. I knew it was Hammer’s fault, of course, but I needed to know the details – how did it work? Was I able to think a lie, or write one down? Could I type up a lie on my phone? Did a metaphor counts as a lie? And what if I said something that wasn’t true, but I thought it was?” He gestured as he mused, as if his interest was purely academic. “For the record, the answers were: yes, no, no, yes, and the last one counted as truth. I had JARVIS run a few tests with me – activate a command when I wasn’t seeing it, and I tried to guess what it was. I could guess wrong, so the ‘truths’ didn’t have to be absolute, just, you know, personal. I could only speak if what I was saying was the complete truth of what I was feeling.”
“Difficult position to be in,” Nick commented.
“That must be your biggest nightmare, right?” Stark needled, his voice forcefully light. “To not be able to keep everyone around you on a balanced diet of pure, unadulterated bullshit.”
“Lying isn’t always a bad thing, Stark,” Nick said. He was fine with entertaining Stark’s provocations, provided it kept him talking. “Sometimes keeping a few secrets can save many lives.”
Stark scoffed. “You’re compulsive, did you know that? Maybe I should give you my therapist’s phone number.”
Nick ignored him. “Everyone has secrets,” he said. “Some are big and important, but others are small and fragile, and they’re best kept away from prying eyes and hands.” Like an initiative built and sustained on an old man’s faith in heroes.
Stark stared at him, then forcefully gave a mocking chuckle. “Don’t think I’m following all the bar table philosophy, sorry.”
“Everybody lies, all the time. You just need to choose when to do it,” Nick replied as he leaned in, holding Stark’s gaze. “And what is worth lying for.”
Stark’s face twisted with something Nick didn’t understand, but his casual façade quickly covered it, and he leaned back and placed his hands on his pockets. “Well, I guess that explains why you’d think it was so difficult to always have to tell the truth.” He tilted his chin up before continuing. “Personally, I think I handled it pretty well.”
“He was freaking out,” Thor said. In response to Hill and Fury’s gaze, he added, with a smile, “Jane taught me this phrase. It means—”
“We know what it means.”
“We woke up the following morning, and Stark wasn’t letting anybody talk,” Barton stated. “He was just rambling like crazy, barely stopping to breathe, and he looked like he hadn’t slept a second the night before. I dunno, I think maybe he thought we’d all ask him a bunch of personal questions on purpose, if he gave us room to do it.”
“Would you?” Hill asked, pointed.
Barton shrugged. “I wouldn’t. But I can hardly blame the guy for being worried. If I was in his shoes, I’d probably just have locked myself up in a closet or something.”
“Tony was trying to seem in control. He acted as if it was no big deal, just same old, same old, and he all but said he knew exactly what he was dealing with and would get it fixed in no time.”
“Except he didn’t,” Hill replied.
Romanoff clicked her tongue. “No. Not at all. And, it’s funny – I think he was almost buying his own façade up until the point where Steve said he had also been affected. That was when reality really started to dawn on him.”
“How long did it take until you connected it to Hammer?” Nick asked.
“Tony figured it out immediately. They were the only ones who came inside the stand – it didn’t take a genius, even if he is one.”
There was a pause where Nick studied her. With her casual clothes and relaxed posture, you wouldn’t think she was in an interrogation. More like she was just chatting with them on a lunch break or something.
“You didn’t act on it, though,” Hill said, finally.
“Well, what could we do?” Romanoff countered. “Knock on Hammer’s door and demand a cure for something we had no way to prove existed?” She let out a tired breath, and it occurred to Nick none of them had any time to rest since the quinjet fell. Coming from Romanoff, that single tired breath was as good as a huge yawn. “We figured whatever he was trying to do, that was only the first part of his plan. JARVIS scanned Steve and Tony’s clothes and didn’t find any sort of recording device, but what is the point of having your enemies be forced to tell the truth about everything if you’re not there to hear it?”
Nick ran his hand over his jaw. “You thought he’d strike directly.”
“With a kidnapping attempt, probably,” Romanoff agreed. “So we decided to wait and try to reverse the serum before he could do whatever he was planning. Besides, with Tony and Steve in that condition, we couldn’t really go outside. There are reporters around the Tower day and night, and they never get tired of printing stories making guesswork about the lives of Iron Man and Captain America,” the slightest hint of disapproval colored her voice, “So why take the risk? We were aware of his game and in a safe space – we figured we’d stay one step ahead of him.” She sighed. “Clearly, we were wrong.”
“Of course I wanted to confront him. The man makes it his goal in life to be a pain in my ass.” Stark grimaced. “But what would that accomplish? Steve—Cap wasn’t thinking straight.” He laid his hand on his chest. “Hammer invited me to the stand. I was the target. To go inside his office just to scream at him would be walking into the viper’s nest. Besides, there was no way he was acting alone - all of AIM must have been onto it, so we’d need to strike them in one of their research facilities, of which there are… well, at least five from JARVIS’ estimates, and none of their locations are publically available. ”
“So you chose to wait,” Hill said.
Stark gave her a stilted nod. “I wanted to focus on undoing it. And then, well – you know what happened after.” He gestured at them. “The message, the quinjet – it’s all old news by now. Are we done here?”
“You crashed a quinjet onto private property,” Hill countered, sharp. “That’s hardly old news.”
“Uninhabited private property,” Stark replied. He looked at them with an almost indignant expression. “We stopped what could have been a massive world-controlling scheme with no casualties, and you’re making a huge deal over what? Some shitty Hammer software that couldn’t stand battle impact?”
Nick made an arch with his fingers. “Is that what happened? The security camera just stopped working?” He paused as he studied Stark with his eye. There was annoyance irradiating from the man, but Nick saw something else: nerves. Fear. “Because see, Stark, I’m not a tech man, so maybe you can enlighten me here, but I’ve never heard of a malfunction where a camera stops working on occasion, just happening to conveniently edit out a huge chunk of footage, and then goes back to work just in time for you all to do your triumphant exit.”
Stark’s eyes found Nick’s, and he stared at him with an expression that was half furious and half pleading. “Listen, this isn’t what you think. We gave you Hammer, the quinjet – hell, I’ll let you search my private drive if that’s what it takes. You’re thinking this is some grand spy-like attempt to cross SHIELD, but it isn’t. I swear it isn’t.”
“It isn’t just SHIELD.” Nick’s voice softened slightly. “The council needs an account, and the press needs a statement.”
Stark snorted, eyes wide with disbelief. “Oh, right,” he bristled. “If there’s one thing the press can’t do it's publish something without being absolutely certain of the veracity of every detail.” He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. “And I guess SHIELD really gets its panties in a knot for keeping information from the public.”
“You know we could end this right now, if you just tell us what was on the tape,” Nick said, tilting his head so Stark could really feel his unblinking stare. “And why you erased it.”
“We didn’t erase anything.”
Nick smiled at him. “Must feel good to be able to lie now, doesn’t it?”
Hill cleared her throat. “Perhaps we should get back to where we were.”
“Fine,” Stark said. “Waste more of my time – not like it’s worth millions or anything. Anything to keep your fantasy that your Spy Kids committee is worth lying to.”
“It wasn’t a fantasy when you decided to keep the information about the serum from us.” Hill turned another page in the file. “For… a week, right?”
Stark ran his hand over his face, dramatically pulling the skin of his cheeks just to exaggerate his eye roll. “Guilty, your honor. Handcuff me and lead me to my cell at once.”
“You know,” Nick commented, letting his voice grow casual. “This schtick that you’re pulling – trying to annoy us into letting you go – it’s not original or subtle, and it’s not going to work.”
Stark’s face was the picture of innocence. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He leaned further on his chair and started whistling.
“We figured we could handle it on our own,” Banner said, eyes darting away from Nick’s, staring longingly at the door. “Me and Tony started running tests immediately.”
“And you decided not to count on SHIELD’s many experts and resources,” Hill stated blankly. “By keeping what was happening from us, instead.”
Banner paused, then shook his head slowly. “No—listen, it wasn’t like that. We thought we’d solve the entire thing in a few hours. I mean – honestly, I was shocked Tony hadn’t already figured it out by the time he told us. It was Hammer tech. It wasn’t supposed to… well, work.”
Barton rested his elbows on the table, gesturing as he spoke. “So Stark and Banner are off to Stark’s lab. And we’re all thinking, they’re gonna have this figured out by dinner time. Except dinner time comes, and they don’t. They’re not even close. So they go back inside, and another day passes, and still – nothing. And by now, we’ve all figured out at least one thing – this isn’t Hammer tech.” He raises his eyebrows. “It can’t be, it’s too complex. So we start wondering where did Hammer get this tech from, and we, and by that I mean me and Nat, we start searching some old contacts, trying to see if there’s any trace of that transaction on the black market, but we find nothing. We send Thor out occasionally to keep the paparazzi entertained, you know, running errands, so they don’t notice that the two most famous people in our group are apparently on house arrest. Now, keep in mind that by now it’s been almost three days without any progress, and Stark is kind of losing it, but at least he’s doing something. Banner is helping him, and me and Nat are trying to figure out what Hammer’s deal was.” He pauses and looks at them like a teacher about to ask if the class has any questions. “Are you guys seeing the picture I’m painting here? And are you seeing the blond, oddly dorito-shaped hole in the middle? Good.”
“He came to me,” Thor said solemnly. “And he asked if I thought Loki could have anything to do with it.”
Hill frowned. “And could he?”
“No,” he replied, almost sadly. “It would have been easier if he did, but this time, for once, my brother was still in the prisons of Asgard, under the care of my mother, when the mischief took place.”
“Could he have escaped?”
Thor scoffed. “Under the care of my mother? No.” He chuckled at the idea. “Oh, no, definitely not. Loki learned everything he knows from her—you know, there was one time, when we were small…”
“Anyway,” Nick interrupted, trying to reign the conversation in. “You said Cap came to you?”
“Yes.” Thor nodded. “His guess wasn’t the best, but, quite frankly, I was happy that he came to talk to me.” He paused, as if considering his words. “I was happy he was talking to anyone . Steven is far from the most loquacious warrior, but, since Hammer’s party, you could’ve sworn an executioner had ripped out his tongue.”
“Can’t blame a man for not wanting to spill out all his secrets,” Nick said.
Thor regarded him with an unreadable expression. “Perhaps,” he conceded. “But there should be no place for secrets among comrades. Or, at least…” He inhaled, and his blue eyes seemed reflexive. “One should trust one’s friends to not use their secrets against them. Thinking now,” his voice was heavier as he spoke, and Nick’s eye widened at how sincere he sounded. “It saddens me neither of them thought they could do this.”
“Yes, I did,” Rogers said, seeming carefully controlled. “And Thor told me it couldn’t be him, so I asked if there was someone else he thought could have done this.” He swallowed. “He said no.”
“Seems that you were grasping at straws a little, Cap.” Hill sounded almost compassionate. She could needle Nick about Stark all she wanted to – she had her own soft spots.
“Well, I had to do something.”
“And I’m guessing Stark and Banner didn’t ask for your help at the workshop,” Nick said. Rogers’ jaw tightened.
“That would have been hard,” he said slowly. “Since Tony wasn’t looking at me. Or speaking to me. Or being in the same room as me for more than three seconds.” He sighed, then looked down at his hands on his lap. “I wanted to confront Hammer, but everyone agreed that was a bad idea.”
“Must have been frustrating.”
“Yeah,” Rogers said, after a pause. “It was.” He pressed his lips in a thin line, then continued. “So I asked Thor if he knew anyone who could undo this. He stopped to think, and then he said there was a friend of his that maybe could help.”
“They just disappeared,” Romanoff said, her voice not betraying any judgement. “Like, all of a sudden – gone. And no one knew they were going to see Heimdall, because, of course, they didn’t tell—”
“Who?” Hill frowned.
“The Bright God,” Thor said, with pride. “The Ram. The watchman of Asgard, guardian of the Bifrost Bridge. Heimdall is not a sorcerer, but he sees all, and I hoped he could give Steve some enlightenment to assist him in his situation.”
“The name is not on the report,” Hill countered. “Actually, nothing about this little trip is.”
“Sure it is.” Thor smiled. “It says we went to pay a visit to a friend.”
“They scared us.” Banner took his glasses off and wiped them on his shirt, absentmindedly. “Sure, maybe Thor had just gone out, but Steve suddenly vanishing – I mean, we were all getting ready for a kidnapping attempt, and this happens? It was worrying.”
“I was not worried at all,” Stark declared, tightening the cross of his arms. “We all knew it could happen. Besides, Cap is a big boy, and he can take care of himself.”
“Stark was climbing the walls. I thought he was accidentally going to reveal the color of his underwear to the National Guard or something, for all the phone calls he was making. He actually almost called you guys,” Barton gestured towards them casually. “And then Steve and Thor decided to show up.”
“Must have been a relief for him,” Hill said. Barton scoffed.
“At first, yeah, definitely. But right after it was clear they were both okay…” Barton mimicked an explosion with his hands. “Boom.”
Romanoff paused before taking a sip of her water. Silence followed, as if she hadn’t heard Hill’s question.
“If you want my opinion,” she started carefully. “I don’t think it was about anger. It was just… frustration. We were almost five days into this, with no progress, and Steve and Tony are proactive people. Steve was sick of standing around waiting for something to happen, and Tony was sick of beating his head against the wall trying to figure things out. In their own way, I think both of them were feeling useless.” She sighed and crossed her arms. “They had spent nearly a week doing their best to not talk to anyone, especially each other. That’s not really a set up for a controlled, polite conversation.”
“So they blew up at each other?”
“That’s one way of putting it, yeah.”
“It got… ugly,” Rogers said, his face twisting like he had a stomach ache. “Do you really need me to tell you this? It’s… just details.”
Hill glanced at Fury, and he shook his head. “There are already too many details missing from this story, Cap.”
A vein seemed ready to pop on Rogers’ neck. “Fine,” he said, strained. “I… I don’t remember how it started. I think Tony said I was acting like an idiot, doing something like that for nothing.” He paused, taking a breath. “And then I said he hadn’t managed to do anything yet either. And it just… evolved from there.”
Nick tilted his head, more than a little curious. “How does one argue with truth serum, anyway?”
Rogers grimaced. “I can’t tell you how it was for Tony, but for me, at least, there were a hundred thoughts coming up at once. They were all true, but I was able to at least choose between them, until… a certain point.”
Hill raised an eyebrow. “Right. And what else did you say?”
Rogers’ nostrils widened as he inhaled sharply. “Tony said he should’ve expected I’d pull something like that, because of course I didn’t trust him enough to let him try to take care of it. I said I was the captain of the team and I couldn’t just stand there and watch as others worked for me. Then Tony said he didn’t work for me.” He ran a hand over his face, his shoulders hunching forward as if the memory was heavy. “Then—I don’t know. In a second, we were yelling about the helicarrier – you know, with the Tessaract.” At Hill’s confused stare, he added, “We never really discussed the fight we had then. But in a second, there we were. Tony said he had wanted to meet me his whole life,” He took a sharp breath. “And then, when he did, he couldn’t understand what his father had seen in me. Then I said when I met him, I thought calling him in was the worst mistake SHIELD could ever make. That if he was what passed for a hero these days, maybe you should have left me in the ice.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Do I really need to go on? Isn’t this enough to paint a full picture?”
Nick studied him. Cutting slack wasn’t his style, but damn if Rogers didn’t look like a miserable puppy sitting on the chair all hunched up like that. “Was it true?” He asked in lieu of a response. “What you said?”
“Yes,” Rogers replied, without hesitation. His eyes, though, told Nick a different story. “I really thought that, when I met him. But it’s like I said – the serum just forces you to tell the truth. It doesn’t force you to tell everything.”
Nick sustained his gaze. The last word echoed between them, and its dimensions seemed dangerous. Curled around it, like a blanket, was a part of the key to this entire thing, Nick could tell, but suddenly interrogating it felt invasive and wrong, and he didn’t want to do it.
“What happened, then?” Hill asked.
Rogers looked at her. “Tony started saying something – I don’t know what it was, because he just managed to go ‘yeah, maybe...’ and then choked. After that...” He looked down, at his hands, and his cheeks flushed a light, subtle pink. “He. Uh. He said something else, and, hm, I think I replied, and the argument died.” At their mutual gaze, he added, “I. Uh. I don’t remember what we said exactly. We were, uh. Very heated.”
Stark stared at the end of his tie as if it held all the secrets of the universe. “Nope,” he said, sounding a little strident. “No idea, sorry. Funny how, uh—certain things just slip your mind, right?”
“Tony said, ‘fuck you,’ and Steve said, ‘I wish you would,’” Romanoff stated, finger playing with her straw.
Nick and Hill exchanged a gaze in stunned silence.
“…Yeah,” Romanoff said. “That kind of hit the brakes on all the yelling.”
“You could—uh, what’s the word?” Thor snapped his fingers as he frowned in concentration. “You could hear a needle drop.”
“A pin,” Hill supplied, helpfully.
“Yeah,” Thor smiled at her. “That, too. So the fight died just as fast as it had begun. Steven went to the elevator before anyone could say anything, and Stark just stood there as if he had been teleported to Jotunheim. Uh,” he added immediately at the quirk of Hill’s eyebrow. “Frozen. As if he had been frozen.”
“And this Heimdall guy didn’t give you anything useful?” Nick asked.
“Not in the way we expected him to,” Thor said. “He could not tell us what Hammer’s plan was, or how to undo the spell. Heimdall sees all, but there’s only so much he can share. He did tell Steven, though”--he frowned a little at the memory--“that what was scaring him the most was not what he should avoid.”
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“It can mean many things,” Thor replied, and it was Nick’s turn to frown. “But I think he was attempting to warn Steven against a mistake we make too often, which is to fight the truth when we shouldn’t. Surely you know what’s that like – sometimes, we lie because we think telling the truth would be a lot harder, but it isn’t. We say things indirectly and make people think we’re saying something else. We get into arguments about meaningless things, and not about what we really want to argue.” He shrugged and grinned at them. “You know what I mean.”
“Will this be in the report?” Barton asked, his voice sharp as he stared at the folder in Hill’s hands. “Because I fail to see how finding out about Captain America’s sexuality helps the public or the Council better understand the situation.”
“That isn’t for you to decide,” Hill said, in a warning tone.
“Bullshit,” Barton spit. “Just because he’s famous, doesn’t mean his life should be up for public consumption. That’s horseshit and you know it.”
“We make the final report,” Nick said. His eye focused on Barton’s hands, which were opening and closing as if he was itching to take the folder from Hill and rip it to pieces. “So we decide what goes on it and what doesn’t. The council decides what goes to the press.”
“Sounds like the world’s dickiest game of telephone,” Barton countered. “But, sure. Whatever you need to tell yourselves.”
“Did you two speak at all afterwards?”
Stark bit the inside of his cheek. “No,” he said finally. “Didn’t seem like there was much to say.”
“Really?” Nick asked, incredulous. “Because from what we’ve heard, there seemed to be a lot to discuss.”
“Well, I don’t know what you’ve heard,” Stark’s voice gained a mocking tone. “But I can tell you that when I was there, it didn’t seem like we could get a lot done, after screaming at each other like two idiots without reason.” His fingers patted the desk. “To be honest, it felt like I had said enough.”
“Did you consider apologizing?” Hill asked. “Trying to get everything sorted out?”
Stark grimaced. “In hindsight, that’s probably what we should have done, yeah. But back there, I…” He trailed off, his gaze finding Nick’s. “It’s – odd, fighting while only telling the truth. A lot of stuff just… hangs on the tip of your tongue, and it can be hard to swallow. You end up just… spitting other things instead. Anything.”
Nick stared at him blankly. “You’re gonna have to be a little more specific than that,” he said. He knew that was maybe pushing a tad too far, but he needed to see exactly how closed off Stark would get in response.
He was shocked when Stark just sustained his stare, opening a small smile. “Maybe I didn’t want to say any shitty half-truths again. And since the alternative was, well – not ideal, let’s put it that way, I thought it’d be better not to say anything.”
“Why was it not ideal?” Nick said, only because Stark’s gaze seemed to be daring him to ask.
“I don’t know,” Stark said, with a casualty that didn’t reach his eyes. “It just wasn’t.”
“And that was when you got the signal, right?”
“Correct,” Banner said. He shook his head with a tired smile. “Perfect timing. Though, when you think about it – of course it was. Just, you know, not for us.”
“It was a distress signal, sent in from unknown coordinates,” Rogers gave the folder on Hill’s desk a small nod, and Nick wondered if he knew everything that was in there by heart. “And it just appeared on JARVIS’ database, almost as if it had always been there.”
Hill frowned. “And it didn’t occur to you it could be a trap?”
“Of course it did. That was why we came.”
“Tony tried sneaking out on his own,” Romanoff told, her hand moving the straw in her glass until the water was flowing in circles without her interference. “Didn’t quite work, though. JARVIS asked him what he was doing, and he just straight up said, ‘I’m going to handle this on my own so no one else is at risk.’” She smiled at the memory. “A little hard to play the lone ranger act when you have literally no brain-to-mouth filter.”
“So you all went together, then?”
“Sort of.” Romanoff made a shaky motion with her hand. “I mean, we took the quinjet to get there together, but Steve and Tony wouldn’t say a word to each other, and trying to get them to was stressing everybody out. So we decided to split into two groups and attack the facility separately.”
“And that was how you ended up as prisoners,” Nick deadpanned. “Not a mistake I’d expect from you, Agent.”
Romanoff shrugged. “Happens to the best of us.”
“We all wanted to spare them from more embarrassment,” Thor said. “So Romanoff suggested we split up.”
“Did she now?” Hill asked, only letting the slightest amount of incredulity show.
“Yes.” Thor smiled. “She can be a very protective person.”
“That wasn’t the most strategically sound idea, though,” Nick pointed out. “Was it?”
“No, I don’t believe so,” Thor replied. “But, in a sense, Hammer’s plan had already failed, so I suppose we weren’t concerned with that.”
Nick blinked for a moment. “You-- what?” he asked, frowning. “You knew what his plan was?”
Thor looked at both of them as if the answer was obvious. “Well,” he said. “Stark was the one who was invited to the stand, so he was the original target. But no one ever attempted to kidnap him for interrogation, so the goal wasn’t to obtain any deep secrets.” He twirled Mjolnir in his hand distractedly. “This Hammer fellow - he’s had this one-sided rivalry with Stark for what? Years? I suppose he’d find hard to believe Stark could fit in a team, as that would be quite a big change from how he used to lead his life. So he created a situation where Stark would be forced to always tell the truth, which could isolate him from us, or lead to conflict, both verbal and physical.” He made a face. “I suppose he wasn’t that far off with the last one. Still, it’s rather simple, isn’t it? Divide and conquer - very Loki-like, though, perhaps I’m being unkind to my brother with that comparison.” He smiled. “Hammer certainly lacked his capacity for subtlety when he sent in the signal, trusting Stark would come alone right into his lair.”
Nick and Hill just stared in silence as Thor playfully threw Mjolnir in the air only to catch again, as if he hadn’t just spelled it out exactly the clear-cut explanation they had been searching for.
Hill cleared her throat, in an attempt to compose herself. “Well. And-- after you arrived, you found out the quinjet had the information you needed to cure the serum, right?”
“Yes.” Thor nodded.
“But then they captured you?”
Thor scoffed. “They were barely ready to fight Stark on his own, do you think they were able to deal with the six of us? No.“ He shook his head in emphasis. “Romanoff figured out the quinjet was meant to take Stark to Hammer when he was captured, so he could gloat about his victory. Like I said - no subtlety. So we decided to deliver ourselves instead, so we’d all get inside the ship and take over it from there.”
There was a moment of silence as Hill looked over the notes from Romanoff’s interview. “...Right. That explains why the quinjet went down so fast.”
“They put me in handcuffs.” Thor laughed. “I thought it was adorable.”
“You know what else happened.” Stark motioned towards Hill. “We took over the quinjet so easily I was almost embarrassed for the AIM agents. They looked sad.” He shook his head. “Anyway. We found the data that showed the gas was still a prototype. Mind you, I think Hammer and the other company heads had mixed goals – Hammer wanted to take me down, and the other guys wanted an invaluable weapon that could grant them control over anyone. I know a little of what it’s like to want to take a business in a different direction, so I empathize, really. And, well… What else? Oh, yeah, they did manage to attempt to set a new course to the quinjet so save their data, so we forced it down to crash it instead. Borrowed a page from Ste—Cap’s book.” He paused, then cleared his throat. “Anything else?”
“Playing dumb doesn’t suit you, Stark.” Nick leaned in. “I know you won’t believe me, but I’m not here to screw you over. I’d hate to see you getting in a bad position just because of a silly lie.”
“Well, how about I believe you when you say don’t want to screw me over, and you believe me when I tell you no one erased the damn tape?” Stark bristled. “And, oh, don’t start with the ‘schtick’ talk again. You’re bluffing and you know it, because you have nothing. To what I’m sure must be your eternal disappointment, you’re not a mind reader, Fury.”
“What happened in the control room?” Hill interrupted their verbal sparring. “Before you brought the quinjet down? If you tell us, the lack of tape won’t be such a huge problem.”
Stark looked at her, seeming thoughtful. He stayed silent for a moment, then parted his lips. “Nothing happened.”
Nick landed his fist on the desk in frustration. The contact caused small sparks of pain to flash before his eye, which helped him focus. “Fine,” he said, surly. He turned towards Stark. “You can go.”
Stark’s mouth opened in shock. “What—”
“You heard me,” Nick said. “We’re clearly not getting anywhere here. You’ve made up your mind, and you won’t tell us the truth, but it doesn’t matter.” His expression hardened as he watched Stark clearly get to the conclusion Nick wanted him to get to. “Someone else will. After all… we still have a guy to interview who’s supposed to be all about honesty.”
Stark’s face fell. “You… Goddamnit,” he cursed, sharp. Then something in his expression softened, and he looked almost pleading. “Look. Can’t you just… lay off of him about this? I mean, shit—he went straight from the quinjet to medical, and he’s only been off the serum for a few hours.”
“So have you,” Nick countered.
“Can’t you give him a break?” Stark continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “Christ – after everything, he’s going to have to sit here as you needle him, make him feel guilty for doing nothing wrong?”
“Tell me what happened to the tape,” Nick said. “And I promise to go easy on him. Make it quicker, and he’ll be home in fifteen minutes.”
Stark seemed to consider his words. “Fine,” he declared.
Hill’s eyes found Nick’s. When he looked to Stark again, the man was staring at his hands.
“It was—well, it was stupid,” he started. “We were kept in different cells, but we all got out when Thor started to tear the place apart with lightning. So I was on my way to the control room on my own, and some of the guards fired a laser at my helmet. It wasn’t quite enough to melt it, but it messed up my intercom. So by the time I got there, the others had already arrived, and they didn’t know where I was, and, uh. I guess Cap thought something had happened.” A pink flush colored his cheeks. “He, uh. He came up to me, and we—uh.”
“What?” Hill asked, leaning forward. “What happened?”
“We… were honest.”
Nick frowned. “What?”
A small smile seemed to color Stark’s lips as he spoke. “Yeah. About… many things. Maybe everything. He started talking, and then I started, and before I knew, I just—couldn’t stop.” His mouth curled in a seemingly uncontrollable grin, and he leaned forward to bury his face in his hands, but through the spaces of his fingers Nick could see he was bright red now. “It must have been a train wreck to watch, because we were talking so much and so fast, we were almost talking over each other, except when we, uh. Weren’t.” He cleared his throat. “And then we’d—uh, go back to talking. I think maybe we’d still be there if we didn’t have to evacuate the quinjet.”
Nick watched him in silence. Even with his face covered, energy seemed to radiate from Stark in waves, as if the memory was enough to make him want to bounce around in the room.
Nick wasn’t a mind reader, but he didn’t have to be one to understand, and a part of him – a deep, deep part he would never let anyone find – thought Stark deserved to have this.
“Hypothetically,” he started instead. “If the tapes had been edited to cover this, why do it? Why go through all that trouble for something so…”
“Small?” Stark raised his head and smiled with a tinge of melancholy. “Fragile?” He chuckled softly. “I guess it would have been a pretty silly thing to do, huh? I mean, what would be the worst that could happen? The tape ends up in—what, the hands of a reporter, and everything gets picked apart and discussed on national TV? The council sees it and thinks it needs to be discussed in SHIELD strategic meetings? I suppose none of these scenarios would be the end of the world, but… I don’t know. I think it’s like you said – you need to know what is worth lying for. And… sometimes, you can keep a secret for other people, but, other times, you keep it just because you don’t want to share it with anyone else. You want it to be… yours.” He exhaled slowly, then, after a moment, shrugged. “You know. Hypothetically.”
Nick felt a knot in his throat.
Dammnit, he thought. Hill was right – he was getting old. Old and soft like an aging marshmallow.
“You know,” Hill said, slowly. “If you still claim the tapes haven’t been altered, and someone else says they were – it will not look good for you.” Stark looked at her, and so did Nick. He imagined anyone else wouldn’t notice, but he could see the glint of compassion in her eyes. “It could make this into a much bigger thing than it needs to be.”
Stark swallowed. “I know,” he said. Then his eyes found Nick’s, both nervous and defiant, and he smiled. “But what can I say? They weren’t.”
“Okay, so,” Hill started. Romanoff nodded at her encouragingly. “We’re almost done here. You’ve been very straightforward with us so far – SHIELD appreciates it. There’s just one more thing we need to ask.”
Romanoff tilted her head at her and grinned. “Shoot.”
Hill drew in a breath. “There’s a gap in the security tapes from the control room, right before you crashed the quinjet. Why is that?”
For a moment, Romanoff stared at her with a blank green gaze, and Nick could almost predict her blunt, matter-of-factly reply.
Almost.
“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Maybe it was a glitch.”
“Hmmm, nope, no idea,” Barton said without hesitation. “Guess the crash must’ve burned something on the files.”
“Uh. Really?” Banners’ eyes darted around the room as he looked at anywhere but the two of them. “A gap? That’s odd.” He shook his head slightly. “I—I don’t know how that could have happened.”
“Human technology can be surprisingly elusive,” Thor said, with a glint in his eyes that reminded Nick a little of his brother. “So in answer to your question, no. I don’t know what happened.”
Rogers looked at Nick and Hill with barely disguised expectancy.
“Is there anything else?” He asked.
Nick and Hill exchanged a glance.
“No,” Hill said, finally, with a smile. “We’ve got everything we need from you, Cap. Thank you.”
Rogers smiled back at her, and despise his clearly tired expression, Nick could see a tinge of anxiety on the way he stood up, nearly running towards the door as if there was something behind it he could no longer wait even a second for.
The council was silent as Nick pressed the “play” button on his phone.
“The quality of this footage is atrocious,” one of them commented.
Nick placed his hands in his pockets, his eye watching the video feed displayed as a hologram on the wall, glitching constantly at increasingly smaller intervals. “We salvaged what we could,” he said, as if he was saying the sky was blue. “I guess that Hammer tech really ain’t shit.”