Snickering a little bit as he sees in Phil's eyes that he realizes what he's just done to himself, Tony turns away from the Agent and hooks his arm in Bruce's in the process. With a swipe of his hand, he gets rid of the holograms and gives Fury an expectant look.
"Shall we, Director?"
Growling, Nick Fury narrows his one good eye at him.
"Watch yourself, Stark."
But other than that warning, the SHIELD Director says nothing else to Tony before turning and retaking his position at the helm. A few moments later and the Helicarrier is beginning its ascent into the air, after which Fury quickly has the stealth mode activated. As that's all happening, Tony pulls Bruce over to the side so they can talk with some modicum of privacy.
"Since you now know I've been your helpful little pen pal over the past two years, I figure it can't hurt to ask… how' s life been treating you, Dr. Banner?"
Just looking at the man, he can tell Bruce is doing a hundred times better. Still, he wants to hear it from the other man directly.
"Pretty well, actually. I've been feeling amazing ever since we developed the treatment that suppresses the Hulk. No more emotional outbursts whatsoever. As you're well aware, so long as I avoid physical threats, I'm just fine."
Tony hums and nods at that. Indeed, with Tony's help Bruce had been able to take Dr. Sterns' data and his own research and create a 'cure' of sorts. Basically, it was a medicine he had to inject once a month that kept the Hulk from showing up no matter how emotional Bruce got. He could cry and scream and rage with the rest of them now, really let out all of his emotions… and there wouldn't be a peep from the Hulk.
Of course, Tony would have preferred it if Bruce had worked towards making peace and common cause with the Hulk instead… but in this case, he knew Bruce wasn't quite there yet. He also knew that ultimately the Hulk wouldn't be contained forever. That was why he'd cautioned Bruce against getting hurt or shot or anything like that.
Partially because he didn't want Bruce to commit suicide when the weight of everything that happened to him truly came crashing down, and partially because Tony was almost certain that Bruce's drug wouldn't work on the Hulk if Bruce' s life was actually threatened. Big Green would definitely wake up then, and Bruce would be right back where he started. It was something of a ticking time bomb, but then Tony was already juggling half a dozen of those anyways, so what was one more right? And ultimately, as much as he liked the Hulk… he liked Bruce at least a little bit more. One day maybe the two could learn to coexist or maybe Bruce would even finally realize the Hulk wasn't completely separate from him at all… but until that day came, Tony would rather have this happy, healthy, mentally stable Bruce Banner compared to the alternative.
"Oh! I heard you had a baby! It was so big it even managed to reach me all the way over in India!"
Tony blinks… and then lets a wide grin spread across his face at that. Flashing out his hand, he lets a holographic picture of his month old baby girl appear in his palm.
"That's right! Here, let me show you what she looks like. Her name is Morgan." Bruce looks down at the picture for a long moment, smiling over it… but of course, eventually his scientist brain gets the better of him.
" How are you … doing those holograms, exactly? That seems like really advanced stuff."
Tony just chuckles and waves his free hand.
"Oh, I've been doing holographic technology since before Afghanistan, Brucie. As for how I'm doing THIS… holographic emitters in the suit. Don't tell the boys over at Armani, they tend to frown upon their customers making modifications to their garments."
Bruce blinks at that, even as Tony straightens his jacket and grins. Alas, that alone isn't enough to quench the other man' s curiosity. "But wait… how are you controlling them exactly?"
Scoffing at that, Tony gives an answer he knows won't be satisfactory.
"I'm Tony Stark, Dr. Banner. How do you think?"
Funnily enough, that more than anything actually seems to work for Bruce. Of course, the true answer is technopathy fuckery, but just invoking his own name also seems to be a reasonable answer.
Chuckling at Tony's big wide grin, Bruce shakes his head and is clearly about to say something else when suddenly Tony has to stop him.
"Hold that thought, Brucie."
Turning away from the scientist, Tony looks over to where Maria is leaning in close to whisper something in Fury's ear. Once she finishes up, Fury whispers his orders back to her and she nods sharply, stepping away to carry them out. Tony, meanwhile, grins.
"Share with the class now, Nicky."
Whipping around, the one-eyed man glares daggers at Tony, but Tony just grins and shrugs his shoulders.
"Let's not forget how things went the last time you kept something from me, shall we Director? I would hate to have to contact Secretary Pierce and see what he and the World Security Council think about who should be in charge of this operation."
That does the trick. Tony hates being so crass as to compare dick sizes with Fury right in front of Bruce, but needs must and all that rot. "… Loki has been found in Stuttgart, Germany attacking a charity gala. She doesn't have Barton, Selvig, or the Tesseract with her according to our eyes on the ground. My plan was to deploy the Iron Legion to capture her and bring her in for questioning. In the meantime, you and Dr. Banner will begin working on tracking down the Cube. Does that plan meet with your approval, Mr. Stark?"
Speaking through gritted teeth, it ' s obvious that if Fury thought he could get away with shooting Tony right now, he would. God, wouldn't that have hilarious consequences?
Tilting his head to the side, Tony finally nods with a smile.
"It does, Director Fury. Except for one thing. Bruce doesn't need my help with tracking the Tesseract, so I'll go with the Iron Legion to Germany."
Fury pauses at that. "… Excuse me?"
Rather than answer with words, Tony just snaps his fingers… which is when the upgraded version of Sneaky reveals itself to be standing right next to him. The bridge erupts into a cacophony of noise as SHIELD Agents all pull guns on the stealth armor, even as Fury's one eye widens in disbelief. Tony just chuckles before giving Fury a curious look.
"I made the Iron Legion and War Machine, Director. Did you really think I didn't make my own suit?"
It's pretty funny, stepping up to the Iron Man Armor and letting it open and then envelope him while underneath his Armani Suit, he's actually got enough Vibranium Nanites to make a dozen Vibranium Nanotech Armors. Its turtles all the way down, but nobody else on the bridge knows so the joke is only for Tony himself.
"Does the Secretary know about this?" Tony pauses and tilts his now-armored head in Fury ' s direction.
"I don't have to consult you or the Secretary on every bit of security I build for myself, Fury. This suit isn't quite as fast as the Iron Legion, but it'll do the trick. I'll reinforce them in Stuttgart and you make sure Dr. Banner has everything he needs to start tracking down Loki."
"I don't take orders from you, Stark."
"Not yet Nicky. But the day's still young."
Before Fury can respond, Tony has already left the bridge. Admittedly, he's lying about this suit's top speed. He could easily beat the Iron Legion over to Germany and have Loki captured all on his own by the time they arrived. But that wouldn't suit his purposes, so he would sandbag things a bit so he got there late. Should be fine, JARVIS was in all of the Iron Legion suits anyways so technically Tony had complete control of the situation, even if Thor showed up like last time to make a mess of things.
There was just one thing that he was curious about after watching the security recordings from the Project PEGASUS facility. Something about Loki that Tony needed to confirm for himself.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
"Unlock the full story now—click here to download the complete novel in PDF and embark on the adventure today!"
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
ko-fi.com/abrahamsmith1b