Come on, this has to be rock bottom
"No," I said, shaking my head. "Mr Stark wouldn't have done that. Wouldn't have continued the Super Soldier program. He knew what the risks to the individuals were. He told us what they were," I said, gaining confidence. "He said that the last trials were inhumane."
"Oh, would you stop?" Tony turned on me. "He was no saint, despite what you want to believe. You know he rarely let anything drop that could turn a profit, and a viable serum would have made a lot of money. He stuffed the Super Soldier program in the Weapons division. The subjects were studied, after, in Division O. As were other mutants--some of the scientists were mutated, like you, in accidents or as a result of their work. Do you remember Lester Grierson?" I nodded dumbly; he'd been in plastics during my rotation there. All of a sudden he retired; feelings were kind of hurt because we didn't get a chance to send him off, and he was only in his early 50s. "His work in plastics apparently mutated his skin like yours was, only his skin was inflexible. He ended up literally unable to move his muscles, couldn't sweat, couldn't eat too much at a meal or gain any weight. He ended up in O. Probably fortunately for him, he died soon after; he had cancers grow that they couldn't treat on top of all that. The only reason you weren't stuck in O when you asked for help is because your mutation is nothing compared to that. My father knew about what they did there, all the testing, and they tried to reproduce the more useful mutations. He encouraged it, for useful results. I looked at the company records; the Super Soldier program was continued in secret once it was officially closed because if they could reproduce the successful formula it would have been extremely lucrative. SHIELD and or the military would have paid whatever price he asked in order to make supersoldiers that actually respected the chain of command." He glared at Steve.
It was too much to take in. I shook my head reflexively. "Your accident was no accident," Stark continued, still enraged. "Steiger"--my old nemesis in the lab, that little weasel--"got a hold of Grierson's medical records, duplicated the mutagen to the best of his ability, and paid that asshole to dump it on you. You thought the guy was fired with you, but he wasn't. He went back to work as soon as Steiger ended up promoted to Deputy Chief of Division O, some four months later. You're lucky the Asgardians were able to treat you. Point is, my dad made all that possible. And if you'd mutated while he was around, he still would have locked you up in O, knowing what would be done to you. He might have visited, but he wouldn't have let you go until every milligram of information had been squeezed out of you. Because it might be useful down the road. He was all about the business and the profits, my dad," he said bitterly. "You weren't as special as you thought you were. You were just like performing monkeys he had a fondness for. You produced results." He pulled out his phone, poked around, and produced a projection of security footage of the lab. I saw myself, concentrating on my project, Steiger looked at me and nodded at the other guy, who picked up the tray, started toward me. The 'accident.' Then security footage, older, Mr Stark and a couple of guys I didn't recognize in an observation room, going through results of some testing on Super Soldier serum victims. He was irritated about a lot of things, swearing and complaining, including the lack of progress in eliminating lesser mutations, but felt that the latest formulation could be made to work. The time stamp was days before his death. I didn't want to see more; I got to my feet, moving quickly down the stairs, leaving the third floor without stopping, going out into the woods until I needed to stop. My dogs found me sometime later.
I returned, reluctantly, to the housing complex after dark, sick at heart, too upset to eat or think straight. At some point, I went to sleep. I woke up late the next morning to a faceful of fur; Torburn had curled around my head like a hat and his tail was draped over my nose and mouth.
After I extracted myself from the dogs, the first thing I did was to get the ring Mr Stark had given us--the ones we thought made us part of something special--and threw it into the recycling. Then I changed my mind and put it in the trash. It didn't deserve to be reused. I took a shower, my mind starting to move again. If Steiger tried to replicate the mutagen that killed Grierson, that might mean that the current resurgence of my mutation was merely the harbinger of things to come. Jesus, I hadn't even considered the possibility of cancers. I threw some clothes on, not bothering with makeup or grooming past pulling my hair into a pony tail, and went to see Nick.
I told him about Rogers and Stark fighting on the rooftop over Bucky and what Stark had revealed to me. "I need those medical records," I said grimly. He nodded.
"Stark and Rogers looked me up last night and explained what had happened; I told him to get me everything his company still has on that man--medical records, everything, without telling him what you told me about your changing condition. It will all be here in a day or two. I told him to be thorough, and sent him to collect it all himself. I saw that little package Stark put together; he did it after that first lunch. Howard Stark is still a sore subject with him, and you're the best target he has for his frustrations. It's true that the military stopped funding the Super Soldier project because the results didn't begin to approach what had been achieved with Rogers, and it's also true that SHIELD kept funding the project afterward. But after several years of infighting, it was determined that if the serum didn't produce a perfect specimen like Rogers, the program would be wrapped up. It was that serum delivery that Howard was making when he was killed. I personally don't think it would have worked much better. I've come around to the viewpoint that Rogers is an anomaly. That serum and that individual. The fact that two superpowers could never truly replicate the results despite throwing a lot of effort and money trying supports that. Bucky might be another exception, except physically, his transformation wasn't as extreme. As for realistically judging his other abilities, that's difficult because he's spent so much time on ice. I want your opinion; Rogers wants to have T'Challa bring his friend here, possibly to join the Avengers. What do you think?"
"I'm too tired to care," I said honestly. "But if it's true, really true, that he couldn't fight his conditioning, then I can't in good conscience say he shouldn't come. If he was a victim, he shouldn't be punished for it."
Nick tipped his head. "And how are you feeling about Stark? Father and son," he clarified.
"The son can go rot somewhere warm and wet," I say with as much heat as I can muster. I paused. "It's harder to adjust my thinking about the father, though." I had no intention of telling Nick how upset I was, crushed and furious and sick, hearing about what Mr Stark had done. I'd thought he was a better man than that. And I didn't mind the idea that Tony would be goaded every time he saw Bucky.
Nick nodded in consideration. "For what it's worth, you might want to remember that Tony is still angry about his relationship with his father when you consider his comments. I don't know the whole truth, and Howard Stark could be quite an asshole, but I do know that he was proud of your group and took mentoring you seriously. One time, before we could get down to business, he made us listen to a story about how he was bidding on some desalination plants for a government contract and how your group had to redo some testing for some component and it got done just under the wire. He said that you had been the lynchpin, working around the clock to get it done. He praised your willingness to work hard when it counted, your ease under pressure, your concentration and your skill."
I remembered that. We'd been working on a membrane for the plant, but the prototype was late in being returned to us for testing, so it had been all hands on deck for close to twenty hours. None of the computers in any of the labs were hooked up to what passed for the internet those days or even an intranet, for security reasons. We rushed the printouts up to Mr Stark with a couple hours to spare, which was just enough time to courier them down to the agency, beating the deadline. The next day, Mr Stark had surprised us with a party, cake and champagne. Helium balloons that he'd filled himself from the tanks in one of the labs. I smiled slightly before remembering that Mr Stark's actions were tainted. "The membrane didn't even make it into production," I said. "Too expensive to produce." I shrugged. "Too bad, it was kick ass. But maybe one day, the cost will come down enough to use." I considered the impact of the story on me, personally. What I remembered the most wasn't the last-minute work, that had happened on other occasions as well, but needing to perform high-level work with my companions, doing it well, and succeeding. Mr Stark had popped in several times to watch our progress, encouraging us, adding to the gestalt. The team effort, that's what had mattered. And it wasn't just a possible multi-million dollar contract that kept Mr Stark coming down; he valued the process and experience too. We all saw that if he knew more about what we were doing, he would have rolled up his sleeves and jumped in to help.
"And I don't believe that he would have abandoned you in that mutant research division, no matter what Tony says," he said with finality. "That story put you on SHIELD's radar, but he refused to bring you in, said that you were too black and white for the business, which requires that you see things in shades of gray. Said you wouldn't play ball, it would be the ruin of you. The other founders weren't pleased, particularly Director Carter, who wanted more women brought in. I understand that this has been upsetting, but frankly, you look like shit. You need to go and eat. Didn't you say that your Asgardian doctor said you're too thin? I'm willing to make it an order that you eat regularly and take care of yourself if I have to; the clinic will stuff you like a goose if they have to." I glared at him. "Stark will bring all the records relating to whatshisname--Grierson--to medical and they will study them, take samples from you, and do their thing. It is too early to panic. Haven't we just been discussing how hard it is to replicate mutations? So you take a few days off. I understand there's some kind of party being planned for Thor's return with Sif, so you could help organize that. Make sure it's not too...whatever."
I stared at him, stunned by his revelations. "I would prefer to do some work. Besides, don't we have a party planner?"
"This is for one of our own," Nick said sternly. "We should put forth the effort."
"We?"
"I'm delegating. Now, get out of my office and do your thing." I left and went to the caf, feeling better about things in general, but kind of disbelieving about Nick's story. But tamping down the panic I still felt about the returning mutation. Nick was right, there wasn't a point to panicking right now. Data first, panic later. It was my scientific method. Plus at some point I would need to talk to the healers on Asgard, but to do that most effectively, I would need all the relevant medical records and it wouldn't hurt to see what our team could do first. I ate as much lunch as I could stand, then found Natasha, who filled me in on the plans that were in place so far. She rolled her eyes at Nick's insistence that we do things ourselves.
"Maria's coming in to help. She used to work for SHIELD but now she's Stark's right-hand woman," she told me. "The rest of us can blow up balloons or something." I grinned at her.
"I'll contact the store room manager," I volunteered. "He does the ordering for all the labs. He can order a tank of regular helium for us."
"Why can't we use what's already here?"
"Because that is highly purified and really expensive. Helium is getting really scarce, though. Maybe we should do something else."
"You're the geek," she said lightly, and we talked about maybe flowers instead. She paged Scott, Wanda and Vision, and we took a fact-finding field trip to a sought-after Seattle florist to talk about table centerpieces and a bouquet of flowers for their room.
After dinner, we split up, and I went downstairs, sagging into the visitors chair. It had been upgraded the prior month to an armchair for comfort. Loki looked at me alertly.
"Well, your brother has gotten married," I told him, and he burst out laughing. I filled him in on what else I knew, which was precious little. "I don't know if Thor plans to tell you himself of he figures I'll do it, but you might want to act surprised if the situation calls for it. I don't want to step on any toes." He agreed, then after a moment, asked what's really bothering me, and I found myself giving the Readers Digest version of my problems. He was silent a moment.
"Well, for once I have nothing to say," he said finally, his smooth voice soothing. "You cannot plan without information. Would you like to view a movie?" I get up, pop a couple single-serve bags of popcorn, carefully stuffing one through the wall slot to Loki, popping Loki's movie choice into the disk player, and I curl up as Loki brings up the inspired lunacy of Galaxy Quest. I quickly explain science fiction fandom to him, and settle in to watch the adventures of Jason Nesmith and his typecast fellow actors. I'm smiling as Alexander Dane berates Nesmith for not being serious about the craaahft when the door opens. I look over to see Cap in the doorway, and the smile fades away. He doesn't say anything, just draws up a less comfortable chair and sits down. Loki and I exchange a glance, and then we go back to watching the movie. When the movie ends, I tell Loki good night and leave, Cap at my heels.