Cruel Vengeance

Avengers Tower

October 2011

“How’s Steve?” Natasha asked.

Barnes looked down. “Awake.”

“And pissed that they’re keeping him in the hospital,” Sam added, stepping out of the elevator behind Barnes. They’d made it to the hospital to visit Steve, stayed there for an hour, and come back, all without more than mild bickering. A miracle. “But Tony said he’d let Loki loose on pranks if Steve sneaked out before the doctors said let him go. So he’s staying.”

Natasha grinned. “Clever.”

“My idea,” Darcy said, sauntering into the room.

Sam rolled his eyes. “Of course it was.”

He wasn’t sure about Darcy. She seemed to do a lot for the Avengers–handling the press, running Tony’s PR department, managing Loki, negotiating things with the State Department, even–and she definitely had a leadership role on par with Steve’s or Tony’s. Yet Darcy had no title, no nickname, and no popular following like those gathering behind the other Avengers. She was their television face, but almost everyone got so busy trying to look behind the curtain that they completely ignored the woman holding it up. It was slightly unsettling. Sam didn’t know what to make of her. She was irreverent, silly, flippant: always on her phone or making a joke. Not that that was bad. It just didn’t seem to jive with the power and influence she was slowly gathering.

Not to mention the fact that she could probably have him out on his ear if she took a dislike to him, and Sam had decided that he definitely wanted to stay.

Barnes settled slowly into a chair beside Natasha. The man never relaxed, not really. He was aware of every movement. Sam made a face at Barnes behind his back–Darcy smirked–and headed for the fridge. He was starving.

“Has Tony made any progress?” Natasha asked.

“Yeah, actually,” Darcy said, and tossed Barnes a tablet. “Here you go.”

Barnes studied the thing for a few minutes.

Sam slid a box of cold (delicious) pizza onto the table. “Give me that,” he grumbled, “you’re taking forever.”

“Maybe if you’d give me a chance to think it through,” Barnes retorted.

“Yeah, well, that might take even longer–”

“You wouldn’t be doing half so well if you got thrown a century forward in time–”

“Woo, look at you, the big bad supersoldier, I’m shaking in my boots–”

“Boys, please,” Natasha said. “You’re both pretty.”

Sam grimaced and flicked through the tablet’s apps. Somehow Barnes ended up in Evernote. Like Tony Stark used that shitty software. Sam got to the StarkPads’ internal synchronized file-sharing system and got the document that Tony’d dumped in there only a half hour before.

“Holy shit,” he said.

“Pretty much,” Darcy agreed.

Sam wordlessly passed the tablet to Natasha. She angled the screen and leaned into Barnes, who tipped his head to read over her shoulder. If Barnes was constantly aware of his own body, he was even more conscious of Natasha, Sam thought distantly. And Natasha was always aware of him, though she hid it better.

Their eyes widened slowly as they read.

“Drugs?” Barnes asked. “What use are…”

He trailed off when the door to their rooms on the next floor up opened and Loki walked in.

“Don’t mind me,” the Asgardian said with a wave of his hand. “Just searching for… ah.” He spotted the pizza on the table and sank gracefully into a seat across from Sam, appearing totally focused on his food and not at all on them. A lie. Definitely a lie. Sam didn’t trust this guy an inch.

Barnes cleared his throat. “What use are drugs?”

“Oh, loads,” Darcy said, her face sharpening into something cruel. “It’s like this: immediate debilitating addiction. It also has the charming side effect of cellular corrosion and erases behavioral inhibitions when you’re high. When you’re not, you’re moody, you’re grouchy, you have no appetite, and can’t focus. If you quit using, your nervous system eventually shuts down. If you don’t quit, you die. Tony estimates two to six years of use before your body basically falls apart because cells are dying faster than they’re reproducing and apparently your organs don’t like that very much.”

“That was all in the report,” Barnes said.

Darcy grinned. “I know that was in the report; I’m recapping because Tony gets all verbose and shit. I made Bruce explain this to me. He doesn’t get pumped up on his ego when people don’t understand his words. Anyway. Kiddie version aside, do you wanna know the worst part?”

“That’s not the worst part?” Sam said incredulously. His brain was spinning. Alien invasions, secret Hydra cancers, and now space drugs?

“Not even close. Our resident extraterrestrial expert–that’s He of the Cow-horned Helmet over there stuffing his face with pizza–” Loki looked offended– “recognized one of the compounds. It comes from offworld. This was definitely part of Hydra’s plan.”

Sam grimaced. “Okay, but like–how does that help them? Money?”

“Hydra’s not short on moolah,” Darcy said. “At least, they weren’t. I’m like eighty percent sure they were selling that drug somewhere, probably a cartel, and hoping to start selling it on the market. Easy way to weaken our population and culture before they invade.” She cut her eyes sideways at Loki. “Seems like they learned from their last attempt.”

“Don’t use unwilling puppet generals,” Loki said, finishing his last piece of pizza. “Yes, that would be an excellent piece of advice for any leader.”

Darcy swatted him. “Dude. Seriously. Leaving no food for the lady?”

Sam realized the pizza box was empty. “Hey,” he said. “I wanted some of that.”

Loki glanced at Barnes, who–shockingly–grinned back.

“Oh, I see how it is,” Sam said, unable to completely hide his amusement. “All you people with bottomless stomachs trying to starve me out. You know what, I’m just ordering another pizza and you’re not getting any of it.”

“Bet?” Barnes asked, leaning forward.

Sam pointed at him. Time to play his ace. “Hell yes. I’m getting pineapple on this bitch.”

Barnes looked scandalized, as he had last week when Darcy showed him Hawaiian pizza. “Pineapple does not go on pizza,” he insisted.

“Not on your pizza,” Sam said agreeably, half laughing, as he dialed Domino’s. They all liked Domino’s best. The one closest to the Tower had been doing a booming business the last few months, Sam suspected.

Barnes scowled, but Sam could see the corners of his mouth tugging upward.

“Glad to see they’re finally getting along,” Darcy stage whispered to Natasha, who smiled.

“Hey, Sam, can I get some of that Hawaiian?” Darcy called over.

Sam put a hand over his phone. “Absolutely. Since you asked so nicely.”

“I hate you,” Barnes moaned, and flopped backwards in his seat.  

With the pizza on his way, Sam returned to serious topics. “About the mystery space drug,” he began.

“Space drug?” Barnes interjected.

“Really?” Sam said, turning to look at the other man. “Do you really have to pick a fight with everything that comes out of my mouth?”

“Well most of what comes out of your mouth is stupid, so yeah,” Barnes shot back.

“Oh, look who’s talking, Mr. Broody Angsty Face, half of what you say is basically ‘boo hoo muh memories’–”

Darcy whistled. “Hey! Hello! Not that this isn’t entertaining but we’ve already seen this show today. Serious topic of conversation? Remember that?”

Amazingly, Natasha, the Black Widow, one of the deadliest people on the planet, was laughing. Barnes shot her a betrayed look, which only made her laugh harder.

Loki raised his eyebrows. “I am continually amazed that this is how Midgard’s best soldiers and defenders behave in their leisure time.”

“Oh, shut up, I’ve heard Thor’s stories,” Darcy said. “He and his buddies get up to way weirder shit than this, and I know you were involved in at least half of it. Sam, you were saying?”

Sam paused. “What was I… oh. Right. I have some contacts in the Army and State Department still, I can talk to them and see if they’ve seen anything overseas. Picked up on any rumors. No one in the CDC, though.”

“I believe Banner has worked with the CDC on a number of occasions,” Loki said. “Perhaps he could speak with his colleagues?”

“Good plan.” Darcy typed something into her tablet, probably a note or a message. “And Tony said he’d work the actual black market for illegal drugs.”

“Of course he knows people in the drug market,” Natasha said rolling her eyes.

Darcy shook her head. “You knew him back in Malibu, you’d know better than any of us.”

Natasha grimaced. “Fair point. That was a wild year.”

“Bet you never thought you’d look back on giant flying robots fighting and Tony Stark turning into a hero as the ‘normal’ days,” Sam said.

She snickered. “If someone had said that to me back then, I would’ve laughed. That was before an alien horde came through a hole in the sky and then, three months later, I made an alliance with the man who led them.”

“Or that you’d have him back,” Darcy said, pointing at Bucky.

Natasha smiled, shook her head. “That was a given. I was always going to get him back. It was just a question of when.”

“So romantic,” Sam said. “So like, on Valentine’s Day, do you give each other roses dyed red with the blood of your enemies, or is it just like chocolate and wine?”

Barnes cocked his head. “That’s actually an interesting idea–”

Sam threw his hands up. “Why did I even say anything?”

“No,” Darcy said, laughing. “No bloody roses in this tower. Way too creepy. We’ve got enough disturbing crap happening without… bloody roses.”

“You are no fun,” Barnes accused her.

“I am the most fun,” Darcy corrected. “You should see me at parties. I’m the bomb. You can entertain yourself in better ways than blood roses.” She waggled her eyebrows in a ridiculous, suggestive manner, and even Barnes started laughing at that one. Even Loki.

Sam’s phone dinged. “Pizza’s here,” he announced gleefully, heading for the box they used to bring food deliveries up from the ground floor.

“No no no do not bring that abomination over here–ugh,” Barnes said, eyeing the box with disgust as Sam plunked it on the table and flipped it open. Gooey, delicious Hawaiian pizza, the perfect mix of sweet pineapple and savory Canadian bacon and cheese and crust and sauce. Sam grabbed a piece and made a show of enjoying the hell out of it. Darcy sounded like she was laughing around a full mouth, and even Natasha had a piece.

“You have betrayed me,” Barnes told her solemnly. “You’re all terrible people.”

“Haffen’ caugh’ on yet?” Darcy said, and swallowed mightily. “We’re all terrible people. That’s why we get along so well.”

“She’s not wrong,” Natasha said, smiling, and reached for another piece.

Sam eyed Darcy, laughing and relaxed with pizza sauce on her fingers. Just a kid, really. Technically not much younger than him, but war ages you. She was just a kid who was doing an incredible job holding up her end, doing a job none of the rest of them would even want, dealing with immense stress, and she could still laugh and joke and stuff her face with pizza.

He decided maybe she wasn’t so bad.

Then he looked at the rest of them. Loki, a cast-aside prince from outer space; Barnes, the Winter Soldier, and the Black Widow, the deadliest assassins the world had ever known; even Sam had a not-insignificant number of lives on his hands. All of them sitting around a table. Getting along. Managing their separate demons, remembering how to laugh. Even though some of them had darkness in their depths that made him wary sometimes, Sam felt more at home with the Avengers than with anyone else he’d ever known.

He grinned and sat back in his seat, mouth full of pizza. This was a good life.