12 chapter 12

Harry stared after the car with mixed emotions, suddenly uncertain of how things would go from here. Yes, he'd managed to get an agreement with S.H.I.E.L.D. – sort of – but not much had been solved. If anything, Fury probably distrusted and disliked him more than before, forced as he was to make concessions given that there was precious little he could actually use to turn the issue his way. Really, the only thing the Director could rely on was a tentative hope that Harry would remain as non-violent as he'd been so far.

A consultant – it didn't even really have a definition. As far as Harry could tell it'd been something Fury had come up with as a compromise, right then and there; some way of tying him to the organization without requiring the many obligations that full employees were subject to. It was, in a way, a remarkably friendly gesture. Also a helpful one, Harry conceded – he'd actually get paid for his assistance, which would go a long way to making sure he'd no longer have to abuse the hospitality of others, as he'd been doing of late.

"So... now we're in the middle of nowhere," Banner commented, staring around himself with narrowed eyes and scratching his head. "Which way to the nearest third world country?"

Harry turned and shook his head in amusement. "Dr. Banner – I think that running off to some distant hidey-hole isn't really what you're after, is it? I already told you that I'd get you some new paperwork, and we're going there first. Then we'll see what we can do about that… other guy."

Banner nodded. "Please... just call me Bruce. As for travelling... We'd be crossing two or three states – I'm not sure which one we're in, honestly – that's not going to be easy with someone like me. The army's got eyes and ears everywhere." Bruce shifted uncomfortably. "You have to realize that Stark supplies them with their guns; he's probably decided to turn me in the moment you stupidly mentioned me on the phone."

Harry snorted. "Tony and the army haven't been on speaking terms, lately. I think you're pretty safe as far as that's concerned. Now, I do have ways to travel quickly over large distances; I figured we could avoid the issue of people spotting us quite effectively." He rummaged through his bag and withdrew the object he was looking for.

"...Why are you holding a sock?"

Harry smirked. "Looks can be deceiving... Bruce. I think you'll find it works just fine for my purposes." He dangled the slightly smelly piece of clothing before him. "I would've considered just – well, 'teleporting' as you call it, but I don't think you'd like to smash up Tony's place; it'd be rude. My way of transport is a bit... stressful. This is similar, but it should be a lot less taxing."

"...Should?"

Harry shrugged, calmly enchanting the sock. It glowed with a soft blue light for a few moments. "It's called a Portkey, though I'm not sure what people around here would describe it as. It's a bit of a ride, but it should be okay for our purposes. I think I'll be able to subdue your change if it does happen, so you shouldn't worry anyway."

"You think!" Bruce blurted nervously, backing away.

Harry grabbed his hand. "Trust me."

Whatever uncomplimentary remark Bruce made was lost when, with a feeling like a jerk behind their navels, the two were whisked away in a kaleidoscopic spray of colours and sound.

"Director Fury, thank you for making time in your busy schedule to take this call," the low voice of an elderly man said. He towered over the room as a massive image on a television screen, though his face was obscured.

Fury sighed, glancing between him and the other members of the council. This was going to be one of those talks, he already knew. "You didn't leave me much choice. You want to help, then tell me what this is all about." Fury growled, staring at the screen with barely concealed annoyance. He leaned back in his chair, putting one leg on the desk in front of him impetuously. "There are things I should be doing. People to see, decisions to make."

"Yes – we have heard about your highly unorthodox pronouncement regarding the subject known as 'Harry'. We have severe concerns about diverting a significant amount of funds to support a vigilante, not to mention that he is a potentially highly volatile element." The man hesitated briefly. "There are other concerns: His interactions with other subjects of programs currently receiving S.H.I.E.L.D. funding may destabilize the whole system."

"…Other programs?"

"Stark is of no concern, but acquisition of his weapons technology definitely is. This rogue element has been known to interact with him, and may have been a reason for Stark's recent resolution to take his company out of the arms market. This Harry certainly has the sheer power to intimidate even such a highly-placed figure. We have no data on what exactly occurred in Afghanistan, after all."

A second figure spoke up. "Maintaining surveillance on Dr. Banner was similarly of little concern due to his apparent wish for anonymity, but once more interaction with your new 'consultant' has led him to return to U.S. soil and made the risk of future attacks much higher."

The first nodded. "Suffice to say that three such prominent and dangerous individuals are unpredictable enough on their own, but jointly… it could turn into a disaster. Supporting such ventures with S.H.I.E.L.D. funds instead of spending it on monitoring or preventing them is extremely unwise."

The third suddenly spoke up. "We appreciate your enthusiasm for attempting to bring 'Harry' into the fold, but your approach is misguided; he would control you, instead of you controlling him. We do not know the limits of his abilities, nor his allegiance, nor his origins. This Harry being a spy is considerably more likely than his claims to be a tourist, as earlier reports indicate. We cannot afford to supply a spy with the funds or access to S.H.I.E.L.D. bases to complete his plans."

Fury frowned. "I elected to go with a consultant position to determine precisely those things. We cannot prevent his visits to Stark or Banner, or his meddling in their affairs. What we can do is set him up against threats both national and foreign, to determine whether he will side with us or sabotage the attempts. Meanwhile, part of the funding we receive goes into determining the source of his abilities, and a possible counter. The results so far are… not promising, but we hope that building some trust may lead us to better prospects; Either his genuine allegiance – or a way to kill him."

"We are not comfortable with this turn of events, Director. This is looking remarkably like a resurrection of the -"

"Suck it up. S.H.I.E.L.D. will deal with 'Harry' and the others as it sees fit; if it is determined that he is a spy or a genuine danger, I will reconsider. We cannot contain him; we do not have that technology. We cannot easily kill him either, and retaliation could be disastrous. The only way we can reasonably act in this circumstance is by making some concessions. I don't like it, but that's the way things have to be."

"You will not be swayed?"

"Not by fear mongering, no. He's damn annoying and nigh-uncontrollable, but he hasn't killed anyone yet; he may still turn out to be a viable ally. I've given him one chance to prove himself, and I damn well hope he takes it."

Harry smiled awkwardly as Pepper opened the door and just stared for a moment. Water dripped out of his hair and off his clothes, and Harry winced as Bruce chuckled dryly. "Pepper – do you have some towels?"

She blinked owlishly as she took in the two thoroughly soaked men, one of which looked decidedly put off by the whole affair. Hesitating for a moment, she finally shook her head and sighed. "I won't even ask. Hold on for a minute."

Harry laughed softly as she quickly moved off, trying to wring out his jacket. The fact that Bruce had panicked considerably more than he'd anticipated had thrown off the Portkey a bit – only by a few dozen feet, but enough to deposit the two of them into Stark's splendidly decorated pond.

"Never. Again." Bruce said, followed by a deep breath as he wiped clumps of wet hair out of his face. "That was the calm method, you said? What's the other one like, torture?"

"I didn't really intend the whole landing bit, honestly," Harry admitted, blushing. "You were just so twitchy. Be glad I was there, I think if you'd gone green and remodelled Tony's garden, he might've gotten a bit irate."

Pepper returned with a tall pile of towels as the two bickered. Harry figured he could've just used a drying charm – he knew a few, but he believed trying to explain how they ended up in his pond was going to be tough enough without also having to explain how they got out of it without a drop of water ever touching them. Clearing his ears and wiping his face with one of the towels, he smiled at Pepper, who looked somewhere between amused and exasperated.

"You got here quickly," Pepper commented. "Tony warned me just half an hour ago that you'd be coming back. He said you wouldn't arrive for eight to ten hours, at the very least; you must've sped up your plans a lot. I'm afraid I don't have any coffee ready."

"We took the express," Harry tried. Drying his hair just made it messier than it already was, Harry realized, and he gave up on it. Bruce seemed somewhat amused; Harry wasn't sure if it was a side-effect of the cheering charms, or if he just looked like an idiot and nobody was telling him. If the former, well, at least those charms had managed to keep the man from bursting out of his skin right there. "Where is Tony, anyway?"

"Um… he's testing something," Pepper retorted. "I'll call him, tell him you've arrived. DON'T leak on the couches; they're way too expensive for that kind of treatment." She squinted at the second man. "I don't think Tony would appreciate you bringing new people in here, even if he does have this unusual tolerance for your nonsense…"

"Aw, come on, Pepper…" Harry whined. "Tony knows about him." He tried his best approximation of puppy-dog eyes. "Miss Pepper Potts – this is Dr. Bruce Banner, expert in numerous fields I don't even know the names of." The two quickly shook hands, though Pepper immediately grabbed a towel to dry off her own.

"You started the party without me?" someone said from above him; Harry blinked and looked up. Tony was peering over the edge of his roof with a curious expression, some kind of blowtorch clasped in his hand. "Well, if it isn't my knight in shining armour. Well, actually, now that I think about it... Yech, I just gave myself some awful mental images."

Harry groaned. "Tony…"

"Just… get in," Pepper said in exasperation. She turned to Tony. "What are you doing on the roof, anyway? Thought you were testing something in the lab? The roof's supposed to be a roof."

"I was down there… and up here. It was sort of a dispersed research project, you know." He gestured. "I was still in the house, anyway. Or on it."

"As long as you didn't smash another hole straight through it," Pepper muttered, dragging Harry and Banner along.

Harry followed the other two in and finally cast a mild drying charm on himself and Bruce, as it would not be nearly as noticeable now; he quickly slipped his wand away again. He had barely managed to fall down on his couch – closest to the windows, where he had an excellent view – when Tony descended the stairs, looking decidedly ruffled, with his clothes in disarray, smudges on his hands, and his hair resembling Harry's own. Bruce immediately stood again, blinking nervously.

Harry remained seated, waving lazily. "Hey, Tony. Judging by your looks, you must've reached the roof via the chimney, eh?"

"Something like that," Tony replied, shrugging. "I hadn't expected you here so soon – indeed, if my calculations are correct, you can't be here yet." He picked up a glass of wine from one of the side-tables; clearly he'd prepared for this, knowing exactly where Harry would take a seat. "You see – you used a telephone to contact me. I was curious where you were, given your unannounced and sudden departure – so I hacked into the GPS chip. Disabled it for you, hope you don't mind. What I found suggested convincingly that less than an hour ago, or more like forty minutes, you were more than a thousand miles away."

Harry scratched the back of his head in embarrassment; he wasn't really used to travelling actually taking a long time, and hadn't thought about it. He briefly considered obliviating the man right there, however annoying that might be to explain to Bruce. He had no idea how such a spell would affect him, and no desire to find out.

"I must inquire – how did you manage to get here at speeds higher than Mach 2? I'd be very interested." Tony smirked slightly. "Did you manage to procure the loyalty of yet another drove of donkeys?"

Harry stared at Tony for a long moment, glancing to Pepper and Bruce in turn. He really should've though that out better, he realized, as the three now focused their sceptical gazes on him; he'd explained none of it to Bruce, and he seemed no less interested. Finally, he sighed. "I… fine, but just you, Tony. I'm not getting even more people involved, that aren't already." He looked to Pepper. "If you don't mind, Pepper? It's not a slight to you…"

She shrugged. "Fine – I'll go see if that guy who's been calling all week has tried again; now's as good a time as any to return the favour, I think." She stood up and scowled at Harry. "Just make sure that your 'secrets' don't blast holes in this house, too, alright? It was a big enough mess trying to cover up that one." She gestured to a tarp-covered section of floor surrounded by a low fence; a similar tarp covered a hole in the ceiling directly above it.

Harry sighed as the others turned back towards him. He might as well get the obvious bit out of the way. "I can teleport."

Tony blinked, taking a few moments to formulate a response. "Well… that's definitely one of the top three coolest things anyone's told me this year that might actually be true. How do you do it? How does it work?"

"Some type of matter-transference via a wormhole, from what I could determine," Bruce supplied. "That's the best theory I could come up with, from the brief time I was exposed to it. Quite disorienting, actually, and it seems responsive to movement while traveling. The instability must be the result of vibrations in the –"

"Space-time continuum? I figured it'd work like that, but how would one access something like that with modern technology, let alone without gigantic machines? You'd need some kind of incredible power-source and an existing rift, I'd figure, or perhaps fusion could be used to…"

"I can't follow a word of this," Harry noted, staring between the two scientists, who turned to him with identical looks of annoyance. Harry, for a moment, felt like he was a specimen under a microscope.

"Teleportation. Well, that just ups the intrigue factor by a few orders of magnitude," Tony said after a moment, prodding Harry in the shoulder. "You're not some kind of alien, are you? I never figured you for one… Then again, haven't discovered any authentic ones, so what can one compare to?" He glanced at Bruce. "You took Banner here along on the trip, eh? Not afraid of another Seth Brundle event? Heck, considering who he is, I'd be afraid to know what you turned into – and quite interested."

Tony stepped over to Bruce before Harry could formulate a response, prodding him in the shoulder too, raising an eyebrow. "So, you're that guy. You know, I had a bit of trouble finding you in the system; almost as if someone wanted to keep me out. Read the most interesting things when I got in, though…"

"So, you know about that…" Bruce observed, rubbing his shoulder. "It's like an open secret, it seems."

"Yes, well, until you tried to bash me into the ground with a giant green fist, I didn't know anything, so it's not all our fault," Harry muttered.

Stark offered his hand. "Dr. Banner, it's a pleasure to meet you. I admit, I haven't had time to study your work, but I'm sure it's quite excellent." He nodded. "Tony Stark, CEO of Stark Industries. I also occasionally like to wreck things and blow them up, so we have some things in common."

"…Pleasure to meet you." The two shook hands and Harry couldn't help but grin; it lasted until the two of them turned to him again, their eyes focussed on him. Bruce blinked and glanced back at Tony. "How did you find out about me, anyway? You've only had about forty-five minutes…"

"Ah, when our resident Q, here, let your name slip, I hacked into the army's database - easy, actually, when you're responsible for coding half the software they use - I downloaded all they had on you, and let me tell you that it was a bit of an eye-opener!"

"I do hope you don't mind," Jarvis intoned from what seemed like everywhere. "I removed the last known coordinates from their databanks; the army will have some trouble reacquiring their target."

"Thank you, Jarvis," Tony said distractedly. He turned to Harry with narrowed eyes. "So, Harry, you know what else I found while I was looking for information on Dr. Banner here? It's the most interesting thing; there I was, reading his file, and - well, what do you know - your name pops up." He steepled his fingers. "Subject Scotty: Someone at the army clearly has a sense of humour. Can you guess what I found in there?"

Harry stared nervously. "…The army knows about me?"

"Oh, a little more than just that," Tony responded pointedly, striding over to a cabinet and extracting a small laptop. "You see, it seems that your particular file has been very active lately, and it's got the most interesting video…" He flipped open the computer and hit a few buttons, finally turning its screen towards them. Bruce gasped, Harry just closed his eyes and groaned.

The image was blurry and shuddering slightly, but the contents were clear: In a partially destroyed section of rainforest, a massive green arm glanced off what appeared to be thing air. Harry stood his ground, one hand raised before him. Four other figures retreated as repeated invisible shields kept the creature at bay.

Harry shook his head tiredly. "…Bugger. I hate cameras."

Tony closed the screen. "Now, I think you'll agree that is a little more than teleportation. In fact, I'd almost go so far as say that it's a lot more than teleportation, and you've been holding out on me." He took a sip and shrugged. "Now, I'd suspected you were weird since Afghanistan – correction, I knew you were weird – but this is a little beyond even my considerable pay grade. I don't get to say that very often."

"You already knew about…?"

"Oh, of course." Tony dropped down onto the couch with a sigh. "You know how you found me out in the desert? You were sweating like a pig, but for some reason, you'd managed to avoid dehydration entirely. Oh, you had water - but only two entirely full water skins. Nobody would throw away an empty one, and you had no place to attach a third…"

"You are observant." Harry noted with a sigh.

"So they tell me. Then there's the transport thing, of course." He paused for a moment. "Wait, does that mean you actually scattered my atoms in a thousand directions and reassembled me somewhere else after transporting via a data-stream? That is remarkable. Huh. I think I need to read up on Theseus and his ship."

Banner snorted; Harry thought he remembered hearing about that from Hermione, but before he got it, Tony had already continued talking.

"Of course, after that you managed to fetch me fresh sandwiches in the middle of the Afghan desert, which was the clincher. It was only slightly less unlikely than you walking in with a cheeseburger, to be honest. If you'd done that, I'd probably have given you my left kidney and converted to whatever religion you might've founded."

Harry groaned. "Now you're just making me look like an idiot."

Tony shrugged. "Suffice to say, you weren't nearly as good as you thought you were. Now…" He suddenly looked serious. "What are you? Who are you working for? What were you doing out there, rescuing me?"

Harry realized that those weren't bad questions. "I… actually did find you by accident," Harry said tiredly, answering the easiest question first. "I was honest about that, believe me. I was flying by and-"

Bruce gasped. "Hold on, fly? You can fly?"

Harry ignored him. "I smelled smoke, and it turned out to be that pile of weapons you blew to smithereens in that cave you were trapped at for months. I spotted you nearby, trudging through the desert and looking dead on your feet... I couldn't just leave you there."

"So you saved me out of the goodness of your heart, did you?" Tony summarized. "Huh."

"You're taking the flying thing awfully well," Banner commented, as he glanced at Tony with wide eyes.

Tony shrugged. "I've seen stranger things. Though, admittedly… I've never had my life saved by a flying, teleporting, force field-generating alien before."

"I'm not an alien," Harry muttered. He thought for a moment on whether or not travel to other realities counted. "I'm just… not from around here."

"See? Alien. Look it up in the dictionary." Tony quipped. "Now, even if I take you at your word there – and damn it, it'd be really awesome if it was true – you still skipped the other question, which is probably more important. Who do you work for?"

"…Then, or now?"

"You found a job? Good on you!" Tony said, earning him an annoyed glare. "Well... Both, please."

Harry nodded. "Back then, nobody. I was sort of on vacation, after a fashion. The desert was a good place to go where nobody could bother me, where there was nobody to give me a ticket for doing stuff that normal people can't." He smiled ruefully. "I hadn't intended Afghanistan, but that's where I ended up."

"Well, I can honestly say I'm glad you picked the worst vacation destination available."

"Well, as for the current situation… that is where Bruce comes in. I got into a bit of a… mess… with a … well, I'll just say it, a spy organization that apparently caught me on video." Harry winced at the look he got. "They taped things they shouldn't have, and got interested."

Tony glanced at his laptop, eyebrow raised.

"No, that's recent; this was a while ago. They sent people after me, and I managed to basically avoid them. They weren't ready to approach me, anyway – similar to Bruce, I suppose. When I got to the U.S. though, they got a little more insistent, and tried to put tracking devices on me. I retaliated, and it sort of spiralled out of control from there…"

"He came to find me, in the middle of the Brazilian jungle," Bruce cut in, gesturing to the laptop. "I was hiding there - I guess you know why. He actually apologized for dropping in on me like that, but the S.H.I.E.L.D. folks weren't very accommodating afterwards, and you saw what happened."

"S.H.I.E.L.D." Tony repeated, narrowing his eyes. "Where do I recognize that from? Wish I had Pepper here now, she's like my personal memory card for that sort of thing." Suddenly he blinked and sat up. "Ah. Them. Damn."

"They're covert military intelligence, and more besides," Bruce added. "They were involved in the experiment, though I've never figured out how large their role really was." He glanced at Tony knowingly; Harry wasn't entirely sure what that even meant. "After the mess in Brazil was over, Harry forced a sort of compromise with the organization."

Tony whistled. "So… what now?"

"I'm a new freelance consultant for S.H.I.E.L.D." Harry said, smiling as he tapped the unmarked, black uniform he wore under his clothes. "I think they're scared that I might start blowing people up any moment now, so they're trying to get in my good graces as best they can. I know Fury was gritting his teeth by the end – that's the Director – and he really doesn't like me. S.H.I.E.L.D.'s also kind of nervous about you two, and your connection to me. They're especially worried about what the three of us together might do. I know that much; I've been listening in."

Bruce started. "What?"

"Well, I'm not just going to take their word for it and believe they'll leave me be," Harry said dryly. "If they're going to send another team after me or you, I want to know about it. You see, as long as I give them the impression that I'm basically in control of you two, they're not going to try much – they're far too worried I'll turn out to be a bad guy, and failing an assassination attempt would basically be the worst thing that could happen. I believe they're afraid that between the brains and power you two possess, and my abilities, we might actually be a serious threat."

"Taking over the world, eh?" Tony commented. "Do you suppose we would mandate that everyone buys from my company? Because that would be really helpful to get me out of some trouble with Obi..."

"Honestly, I'm hoping I can spend a few days without any world-destroying threats, from us or anyone else, so I'll go fix up my guest room." He gestured to Bruce. "I hope you can arrange the big guy's new identity, and I'll see to it that he gets somewhere safe where he won't get hassled by the military." He turned to Bruce with an apologetic expression. "I know that you'd prefer to just leave right away, but I think after that near-change you had earlier, going by normal means is probably the safest. I'm sure that Stark could arrange a nice ride."

"You spend my money almost as easily as I do," Tony muttered, rolling his eyes, as Bruce headed up the stairs, to find an empty room and stash his few belongings." "Harry – this whole teleporting Jedi alien thing; you'll let me test it, right? I want to see what you're using to do this." He paused briefly. "Purely scientific interest, of course. It's not just childlike enthusiasm, I swear!"

"We'll see. If you try to dissect me, I'll stick you to the ceiling and leave you till morning."

"…I'll show you what I'm working on, if you help me?" Tony tried, smirking.

Harry didn't respond. He was about to head after Bruce, when Tony called. "Stop. Hold on, Harry."

Harry turned back; he blinked at the dead-serious expression on the other man's face. "Yes?"

"Listen..." Tony looked away, frowning. "I think things are going to get really ugly, really soon. When the inevitable blow-up happens, can I count on you?"

"...What brought this on?"

Tony turned away entirely. "Call it intuition, if you wish. I don't know what the hell you are, but if you can keep that thing in Banner under control and you actually give a damn about the people around here, you can make a difference. I'm ready for war, any time, should it be needed - are you?"

Harry sighed, and he could scarcely remember a time he hadn't been fighting. "I was born for it."

"…That took a while."

Fury nodded. "They had a lot to say."

"Anything worth repeating?" Agent Coulson asked as he quickly followed Fury towards the bridge.

"Not in polite company."

"So… what do we do?"

"We keep doing what we're doing, and tell them that we're doing what they want us to be doing." Fury smirked. "You can figure out how. Cook the books, get creative?"

"Is that the best plan of action, moving forward?" Coulson wondered, frowning. "Sounds dangerous."

Fury shrugged. "If it's not… we're going to find out the hard way."

"At 8 A.M. this morning, cellular biologist Samuel Sterns disappeared from his laboratory, signs point to a kidnapping. Along with himself, a great number of experimental samples were taken, though police reports do not indicate what they contained."

General Thaddeus 'Thunderbolt' Ross sighed, dropping the paper onto his overly full desk.

"General?"

He turned on a dime, staring down at the diminutive private holding a stack of paper, who had entered his small man trembled slightly as the General flipped off the light on his desk and gestured for him to speak.

"I'm from IT, sir - someone's hacked into our systems." He paused for a moment as he quickly flipped through a printout. "Whoever did it, removed data from our normal servers and the backup. The updates that were lost were too fresh to have had a solid backup yet. I'm afraid the only remains are a few print-outs."

Ross growled. "What information did the hacker take?"

"Something concerning a 'Banner, B.', sir."

"Tell me everything," The General said, eyes narrowed.

"Whoever broke in removed all new data of the last twenty-four hours." The Private continued, handing over a small hand-held computer that he'd stuffed in his breast pocket. "This has the details; the people who have seen the data are being interviewed so we can determine what in particular has been lost; a trace is being done on the signal of the break-in, but it looks like it was rerouted extensively. Still, we're expecting a result within half an hour."

"Get the tall guy in here," he said darkly. "I want a word."

"Yes, sir."

The General frowned as he read the reports, looking at several stills that displayed what he'd expected – Banner during a recent episode, somewhere in the forest. Alongside was a second person, designated as 'Subject Scotty.'

"You needed me, sir?" A soldier said as he entered the tent uncertainly.

"Captain Blonsky. I want you and your unit to get ready for deployment. Our target's on the move, and trying to cover his tracks; the moment we know where he's at, we're sending you there to take him out."

"Yes, sir."

"What's wrong?"

"I don't know… something has been unsettled. There is a new twist in things. I sensed a strange thing earlier today – something I hadn't felt in centuries, and it confused my senses. It seemed like something that couldn't be… For a short moment, I believed-"

"What?"

"…No, it is folly. I believed – that someone had sneaked by me."

"Surely that's not possible. You guard the way!"

"So I do. Yet, I wonder." He turned around and gazed worriedly at the Bifrost. "I truly do wonder."

"Let such things not worry you overly, Heimdall. I am certain it was nothing."

"Nothing…" Heimdall did not look convinced. "Let us hope so."