Legend

When I dragged myself into work, still feeling emotional not only from Margaret's death but my own escape, Doug had grim news. Most of the people who he'd called to reschedule the past two days had not made new appointments. This was bad news. "I explained what happened," he said worriedly. So I called the clients myself, apologizing for the necessity of having to cancel the appointments. I didn't get to talk to many, so I left messages, but I did get one person to reschedule. I put my head in my hands for a moment, praying for strength, then got to work on the genetic analyses. I took a break to go work with Bucky, then returned. I had three clients this afternoon. I had to give myself a stern talking to, trying to avoid panic.

After work, I went down to spend some time with the punching bag and beat down the urge to overreact. But my financial margins were thin. I needed to do something, and fast. As I was cooling down with stretches at the barre, my phone chimed with an incoming Skype request from J. Geeze, I hoped he hadn't done poorly on another grade, he'd melt down.

"Hi, J," I said. He looked tense.

"Hey, Alex. How are you doing?"

I tried to make my smile confident. "It'll get better with time. How are classes?"

"They're good. Learning a lot. That's kind of why I wanted to call." He took a deep breath. "I don't really want to pursue psychiatry, I don't think."

"Ok, so what do you want to do?" I asked blankly, wondering how we'd adjust the business.

"I'm not sure, actually, but I'm leaning toward epidemiology, public health. Maybe toxicology." He bit his lip. "I don't know how to dovetail our interests together. I think you'd better focus on what you want to do." I felt gut punched, a little, both by the rejection of our plan and by a relief that if I sank the business I wouldn't be dooming him too. "Are you mad?"

"I don't know what I feel right now," I said, sitting down.

"Ok." He chewed his lip. "Also, I was wondering if I could get a sample of your DNA. One of my professors is interested in superhuman genetics and I said I'd ask you."

"You told a stranger I have mutations? Damn it, J, you know I don't like to tell people about that!" I said, anger starting to burn. It's true, the only people I told about my mutations were doctors and my closest friends.

"He's not a stranger, he's my professor and a doctor," J argued.

"He's a stranger to me," I said flatly. "I don't know what he wants the data for or what the end game is and I'm not comfortable with people having my genetic information. So no. Additionally, I'm not superhuman. I'm just enhanced." So we had a spat. He thought that if he'd asked for the sample first, I'd have given it, but he was wrong. I didn't like other people having my DNA; I barely trusted Hank with it and I liked Hank.

"I'm surprised," I admitted to Damian when I went home. "This is the first I'd heard that he wasn't all gung ho about psychiatry. It kinda hurts that he's rejected the plan, but I don't want him to do something he doesn't really enjoy. I'm pissed that he as good as promised his professor he could have my DNA. Mutations are hot-button issues right now and who knows what people want to or are doing."

"What do you want to do?" Damian asked, cuddling me close.

"I have no idea now," I confessed. "It was all about how our work could work together. I always pictured us getting one of those partner desks. But I haven't been able to get all my clients to reschedule, so my business might be circling the drain."

"Oh, sweet pea, you've had a few hard days," he said. I felt somewhat comforted by the rumble of his voice in his chest. After I felt better, I made dinner and we curled up on one of the windowseats where we could look at the park occasionally, each of us with a book. After a couple of hours of this, he rummaged in his briefcase and brought out a bar of caramel-filled chocolate, which he fed to me square by square. "Sweet pea, if you were a brand new graduate, if you could go anywhere and do anything, what would you do?"

"I don't know," I mumbled around the chocolate. "It was all about how J and I could work together."

"What grabbed your interest at MIT?"

"In biological engineering, I was really interested in energy; its cutting edge, looking into using bacteria and viruses as a novel energy source. And there are some really exciting bioremediation possibilities as well. But there was also toxicology, looking at how chemicals and biological processes can damage DNA, how this could be assessed in a single cellular high-throughput manner, analyzing the effect of deficiencies in the DNA repairs. Its a crazy intersection of environmental health and biological engineering. Alkylating agents are pretty reliable at damaging DNA, and cancers often result, but there are inquiries into other diseases and inflammation as well." He sat silently a moment.

"You know I didn't understand a word you were saying once you got into the toxicology stuff, right?" he asked ruefully, and rubbed his cheek on my hair before kissing me. "Look, don't panic, is all I'm saying. Even if you run out of money next week, don't panic. You have options. What you're interested in, that we just talked about, isn't something that you can really pursue alone, I'm thinking." I shook my head.

"The days of the citizen scientist being able to work out of their basements is long gone," I said, a touch sadly.

"You sound regretful," he noted, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.

"I am, kind of," I confessed. "That kind of work was all about your personal innovation and ability, what you understood and what you made of your knowledge. You set your goals and parameters, followed what caught your interest. But the lab equipment alone makes that completely impractical these days."

"Rugged individualism," he proclaimed, and I laughed. He smiled. "I know you don't like to rely on other people or take what you would think of as a handout," he said gently. "But we're together, I love and treasure you, and I can certainly afford to support you while you make up your mind what to do next. You have degrees in biological engineering and kinesiology, which gives you a lot of scope. You can brush off your resume and start sending it out, or..." I prompted him with a look. "You could let my dad and Stark fight over you like dogs over a bone." I burst out laughing and he chuckled. "You're going to have to tell them what's going on," he pointed out. "So tell them and give them some time to see what they can come up with. If you want to go with energy, Stark's your man because he's the name in clean energy. Wayne has the medical research apparatus that Stark lacks and you could fit into toxicology there, I bet." He put his arms around me and drew me in tight. "The thing to do now is just to relax. I know you hate the idea of failing at your business, especially after the interest that others have put into it, but to tell the truth, I don't think it really makes the most of what you can do. You compromised for your brother. But now good chunks of the world are open to you. So don't freak out, don't take the first steady paycheck that's offered to you. You've been through so much this week, I don't know why you're not gibbering in the corner, that's where I'd be."

"At this point, I'm just waiting for the next disaster," I muttered. "But ok. I won't do anything precipitous."

"Thank you, sweet pea," he said. "Do you want to go to bed early?" he inquired. "I bet I could get your mind off your problems. Not to brag, or anything, but I do have certain gifts." I chortled and sat up.

"Do your best, honey," I said, and let him pull me to my feet, where he swept me up and carried me down to the bedroom. There are a lot of advantages to being a hero, and one of them is core strength.

He did provide a magnificent distraction, but when he'd fallen asleep, I extracted myself carefully and went down the hall for a good cry. Damian was amazing and wonderful, but I was just feeling overwhelmed and sad and I didn't want him to be upset too. One of us had to keep their head on their shoulders. He's a tremendous problem-solver, but there was only so much he could do for me. I had to get through the emotional stuff myself. I texted Aslyn; she was also up--having trouble sleeping--so we updated. Her advice was similar to Damian's--don't panic, do some research. She provided a second opinion, which I also trusted and could rely on. I felt a little less like the ceiling was going to fall in and crush me, and went back to bed, snuggling up to Damian, and got a pretty good night's sleep for the first time in a few days.

The next day I went in as usual and requested a meeting with Tony and Bruce.