CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

If I could help you forget

A grave silence fell between the group of seven agents as they sat and waited for their plane to take them to their first destination. Most everyone sat close to one another and conversed quietly. But Tegan, ever determined to remain the loose end of everything, had situated herself as far back in the plane as she could possibly manage. With closed eyes, she leaned against the metal hull of the plane and let the hum of the engines lull her into a light state of slumber. Her mind bounced with several different thoughts and ideas. Most of them pertaining to the shadows that Erik had planted in her, of the things he had made her grow to fear. But some thoughts drifted to how she was going to manage to do her job. They'd assigned her with the duty of specifically seeing that Tony and Bruce did not fall under any sort of attack while they were working to figure out how to shut down the reactors without setting the thing off. Normally, she wouldn't have found this to be that difficult of a job, but her own reservations against Tony (Bruce she had no underlying problems with) threatened to compromise her. Deep down, she knew that she would be able to hold back her own reservations towards saving or blocking things from Tony Stark if the time came, but on the surface she worried about her own humanity and whether or not she'd actually take a bullet for him.

Tegan was an unfortunately selfish creature, and for as much as camaraderie meant to her so did saving her own skin. It wasn't uncommon for her to be constantly conflicted on missions over who to save first: herself or her partner. Usually, she battled the urge to run and rescue herself long enough to overcome it and do what she was trained and paid to do. However, this had not always been the case. Many a mission had been forfeited to her own inability to control her self-centered tendencies. Granted, it wasn't like every mission she'd taken on when she was younger had ended up so badly, but two was enough to give her a bad enough reputation to warrant worry from anyone unfortunately paired up with her. In time she matured and learned to hide her inhibiting selfishness, and while you could cover up something effectively, there was always the test of time that the walls built had to withstand. For Tegan, as the years dragged on, her acidic attitude dissolved any inhibitions she'd had towards maintaining a selfless persona. In the end, her argumentative mind-set beat out any altruism that she ever had. If the six Avengers knew of her previous failures and seeming inability to risk her life for others, they didn't exactly say anything about it. Though, she knew full well that she had not spent the last three years making friends with them enough for the plane ride to be comfortable. When she should have been busy establishing herself as a trustworthy member that wouldn't throw off the balance the group of fighters had been working so hard to establish, she was instead tearing down all trust and burning as many bridges as possible.

It wasn't like she actually meant it; it was just that her habit of creating dissention in any group generally went unnoticed by her. Her arrogance far exceeded her ability to reflect internally and accept her flaws. Yet for as much as she made herself an outcast and sat on the edge of what everyone else had, she looked in on the camaraderie that the Avengers had and craved closeness like that. She wanted to be able to sit down with a group of people and find comfort in their presence and know for certain that they would sooner stab themselves in the back than stab her back. For the time being, this was not going to be possible for Tegan. The saying 'you give what you get' very much applied to her, and Tegan did not give very much to anyone; even though she demanded a great deal of everyone else.

So to say that she was surprised when Bruce Banner finally dislodged himself from the quietly talking group to carefully walk to where Tegan was sitting and ask if she minded if he sat with her would be a little bit of an understatement. Of everyone in the plane, she would not have expected Bruce to be the first person to break the ice that she'd put between everyone. Her hazel eyes gave him a steely gaze of indifference and flickering suspicion as he offered her a smile and sat down across from her. Curling up farther into the back of her seat in an effort to continue to distance herself, she tilted her head to the side and studied him as he situated himself. She'd never actually been this close to the infamous Dr. Banner and the only times she'd ever actually seen him on the Helicarrier had been in passing and in the dim meeting rooms and occasional meal time visits when she felt the need to be right in Natasha's face about something.

He had curly black hair with traces of silver –no doubt from stress-, lines of age creased his face, and yet for someone that harbored such a burning anger within him, he seemed almost painfully at peace with the world. Though, Tegan figured that he had no other choice but to find concord in the chaos that reigned around him. Clenching her jaw she waited impatiently as he reached under his seat and pulled out a leather bag and placed it on his lap. Methodically, he began to draw out what looked like a sketch pad, note book, and a pen and pencil. Screwing her face up in an expression of confusion as she failed to see where he was going with all of this, she instantly jumped to conclusions and loudly barked,

"If you want to do a therapy session, you can just fuck off. I'm fine."

For as rude and angry as her assumption was, Bruce only smiled and shook his head as he continued to set up a little work station around him and replied to her in an even tone,

"A clever hypothesis, Tegan, but I'm actually not interested in your psychology."

As she narrowed her eyes suspiciously at him she jerked her chin upwards in curiosity of the pads of paper he had laid out on his lap and apprehensively questioned,

"Then what are those for?"

In response, he offered her a small smile and a soft-voiced answer, "I'm curious to see if you remember exactly what the machine that brought the Tesseract back looked like. I'm simply trying to be a little more prepared than being dropped into a warzone not knowing what I'm working with. Any little detail you can give me will help."

Blinking once or twice at him, it seemed that Tegan instantly warmed up to him and relaxed a little bit; almost relieved that she wasn't going to have to defend herself or talk about her 'situation'. The last thing she really wanted was to be evaluated on a plane on the way to a very important, potentially fatal mission. She was grateful that finally someone was focusing on the information she could provide rather than the hindrance she posed. Leaning forward a little bit she looked at the pad of paper and began to describe with a hesitant sort of mannerism as to what she could remember. Once or twice she closed her eyes and tried to picture being in the moment. She could remember the rush of adrenaline and equal shot of fear that tightened around her heart and throat as she witnessed in awe of what was going on before her eyes. In honesty, she had not paid all that much attention to the actual machine, but she did her best to provide Bruce with what he wanted to know. By the time they were still discussing the details of the machine an hour later, she had moved to sit next to him and had taken the sketch pad into her lap in an act of impatience. She erased lines that were wrong and redrew what she could remember.

Pulling it back a little bit she examined their handiwork and Bruce began to theorize what it was and how it worked. He spouted out all sorts of science information that Tegan had no idea of what it meant, but her curiosity kept her glued to the seat as she watched him begin to write out complex algorithms and theories on his note pad with a pen, furiously scratching out anything that he deemed pointless. Once or twice, she asked what a certain symbol meant and listened intently as he patiently took the time to explain to her in every day terms of what it was and how it posed as a variable or constant in the equation. While she didn't exactly understand most of what came out of his mouth, she felt a strange sort of satisfaction to know that it wasn't just crazy magic or her imagination that'd caused her to see what she'd seen at the compound; rather it was just a bit of astrophysics and laws of physics that made the machine summon the universe's most powerful known weapon appear in a room on demand like a movie on TV.

What the pair did not notice was the group of five other agents sitting and watching in strange confusion as Tegan hardly made a rude quip about the good doctor or his anger management issue. Natasha seemed a little less shocked than everyone else and once or twice confirmed that she had always tried to tell them that Tegan wasn't exactly a hardened bitch with the absolute inability to reciprocate curiosity and respect. She explained that it was just something hard to come by. Of course, Tony pointed out that Bruce had managed to sit near for over an hour now, and not a single bad word had come out of Tegan's mouth and therefore that meant that he was either a demon whisperer or his own radiating anger canceled out Tegan's equally bad attitude. Thor and Clint did not seem to show much interest, as they voiced that they were far more concerned about the impending mission and whether or not Tony and Bruce could actually cut off the reactors without blowing up wherever these things were being kept with them in it.

What no one really seemed to notice, however, was Steve's flickering frustration as he watched the two at the back of the plane. He tried so hard to not be jealous of Bruce; but what he had been fighting for from Tegan ever since he'd brought her back from the compound barely alive, Bruce had gained in less than five minutes. From Steve had observed, Bruce had done nothing different than Steve had been doing. He gave her unearned respect and didn't bother judging her for what everyone else was eager to judge her on. So what had Bruce done that he could not see that made the otherwise icy agent warm up to him so quickly. He would never voice his envy, but before he realized what was happening, it started to settle in and eat him up. In danger of dwelling on it for the rest of the mission, he quickly averted his eyes and shook his head. Leaning forward he placed his head in his hands; how hard was it to ask for a slight extension of friendship from Tegan or even a shred of respect when it was now obvious that she had the ability to recognize someone as a non-threat to her and warm up to them immediately? For Steve, apparently it was impossible. In a way, he was curious how she would react to Clint or Thor alone in such a situation, but his desire to figure out whether or not it was a 'just him' situation had to be abandoned as Bruce thanked Tegan for her time and walked back over to where everyone else was sitting.

Tony eyed his friend for a moment and starkly said,

"You are a god damn snake charmer, you know that?"

Bruce furrowed his brow slightly, having missed out on the conversation that'd been held between everyone to exactly understand what Tony was getting at. It also didn't help that he'd never actually minded Tegan's presence. Sure, he found her annoying and a bit brash, but in the end he never found much resentment towards her within himself like Tony seemed to. Shrugging finally he just sat down and dismissed Tony's dry comment and began to explain what he had postulated based on the information he'd been given.

Steve tuned out their musings half-way through, as he'd lost the meaning of what they were saying several minutes into the conversation. After all, his main concern was not the physical shutting off of the reactor; it was protecting Tony and Bruce as they worked to cut it off and warding off any attacks that came their way. Sitting up, he leaned his head back into the back of his seat and fell into agonizing assumptions about himself and why Tegan was so eager to avoid and be angry with him when he had actually not done a single thing to warrant such behavior from her. After all, did he not deserve having her act pleasant towards him? He'd saved her life; all Bruce had done was assure that he wasn't going to psychoanalyze her. Where was the fairness in that? Closing his eyes, he did his best to pull away from his self-degrading thoughts and instead focus on the impending mission.

After having set off a seemingly surprising reaction within the Avengers pertaining to her reaction towards Bruce, once the initial chatter of how he'd managed to do it –with Tony loudly talking about her as if she wasn't in the plane or within earshot- they all eventually settled down into a morose silence as they waited for the plane to arrive in Portugal. Once or twice, Tegan let her gaze slide over to Steve. He sat quietly with his eyes closed and his head pressed up against the back of his seat. His normally neutral face wore an expression of something that might have been a mix of confusion and anxiety. Not knowing any better, she simply assumed that it was his worry over their task. It wasn't like they'd been given something easy to do. This was no information reconnaissance mission, this was a plan to bring down the biggest leg that the Central Forces had to stand on, and if they managed to take it out, they all assumed that HADES would fall and the war would come to an abrupt and much needed end.

The hours stretched out into an unbearable amount of time as everyone slowly began to grow more and more anxious to arrive for their first mission. Eventually, the pilot announced that they were entering Portugal air space. From there, activity seemed to increase in the group of seven people as they all began to prepare themselves for the parachute drop down into Lisbon. As everyone eagerly gathered in the back of the plane by the hatch where they'd be dropping out from, Steve remained seated, quietly with his eyes closed. To the untrained eye, he seemed to be sleeping, and Tegan made this unfortunate mistake as she stalked back to where he was sitting and with a half-kick, half-nudge on his shin and said,

"Hey, Captain Apnea, we're about to drop out. You should probably get up."

Snapping his eyes open, Steve didn't even mean to be so hostile towards her as he hissed through clenched teeth,

"I wasn't sleeping."

A little taken aback by this attitude she took a small step back and wrinkled her nose in distaste, but she didn't offer him much more than a shrug of her shoulders and a simple, "if you say so."

Turning, she walked back to where everyone else stood and shrugged her parachute pack on and leaned against the metal hull of the plane. Once or twice, her gaze shifted back to Steve who was now standing up and was carefully securing his shield onto his arm and his parachute onto his back. The way he moved hinted a greater annoyance than he was letting on, but Tegan didn't have the extra energy to devote to caring about what Steve (or anyone else) was feeling about the task ahead. All she had time for was to worry about how she was going to manage to sacrifice herself for the safety of others and completion of the mission.

Finally, the hatch of the plane opened up, and like birds pushed from the nest they all filed out into the cool night air. The darkness consumed them and they dropped down at the edge of Lisbon in total discretion. Ditching their parachutes and securing everything they needed without backpacks to themselves, Bruce turned on the locator that'd been designated on finding the energy signature, they were all pleasantly surprised to find that the route they'd have to take to wherever this thing was being held. Silently they slipped through the little outer communities that surrounded the city. For the most part, the small party was quiet, all of them anticipating the fight that was certainly going to be coming their way. Their walk was barely five miles when they came across a heavily guarded, yet seemingly deserted warehouse. A quick survey of the area proved to reveal information of three guard towers with what looked like flood lights and machine guns on them. With a little help from Tony in his suit, Clint perched himself at the top of one of the trees outside the warehouse and made quick work of these towers. Confirming that the coast was clear, Steve ordered everyone through a hole he'd had Tony melt through the electrified fence. Silently, they stalked through the shadows cast by the lights all around the compound, avoiding groups of guards on nightly patrols and managed to break into the main building that the tracker suggested the reactor was being kept in. They all slid into the cold room only lit by the blue light emanating from the reactor in the center of the room.

It seemed that almost everyone was staring up at the massive machine that reached from the floor to the ceiling, with wires, tubes, and vents protruding from both sides with a dreadful awe. Immediately, Tony and Bruce began to carefully edge around the room, taking caution to step over wires and other parts of the potentially unstable reactor. Everyone else spread out and poked around the other entrances, ready to secure them and keep anyone out while Tony and Bruce worked on shutting the thing down. Having been charged with 'protecting' two men who were considerably capable of fending for themselves, Tegan followed behind them as they edged around the room, poking at things and talking amongst one another about possible sources that powered the reactor. Again, they began to talk in a fast pace about a lot of things Tegan didn't understand and most of their babbling and instead merely gripped the handle of her gun harder and tensed up, ready to spring around and defend what she was supposed to defend at a second's notice.

Having been so focused on following them that she did not even realize that Tony and Bruce had stopped walking all together and with her head turned to the side, she ran right into the hard metal of Tony's suit. Reeling backwards, she hissed and snapped angrily about them warning her when they were stopping. However, she was paid no mind as the two men bent over a complex looking keyboard with no screen. Before Bruce could say anything to stop him, Tony reached down to press a couple commands on the keyboard. Unfortunately, this did not seem to be the right thing to do, as all of a sudden the entire room went dark and a red flashing light in the corner of the room began to blink rapidly followed by an ear-splitting siren. Over the sound of the alarm, Tegan could heard Bruce scolding Tony,

"Why did you do that? Why would you do that?"

Looking from his friend to the keyboard and then back over his shoulder at the reactor he said sardonically,

"I regret doing that."

The sounds of scuffling behind her caused her to turn around, only to find a throng of guards fighting to pour into the doors and barely held at bay by the remaining four Avengers. Her gaze darted around the room as she searched for any other doors that guards could possibly come in from, but when her sweep came up negative for extra entrances (also meaning that their only ways out were blocked too), she focused instead on the few guards that were managing to get past the others and taking aim with her gun and shooting them down before they could make attacks on anyone else while equally dodging bullets and streams of blue light from whatever weapons HADES had provided their guards with. Narrowly avoiding a potentially crippling shot from one of the said weapons, she briefly took the time to scream above the sounds of chaos at Tony and Bruce as they diligently and frantically worked to break whatever code was protecting the reactor,

"If I have to literally take a bullet for you, Tony Stark, I'll fucking kill you, you're an impatient ass hole and I hate you!"

Author's Notes: Jesus, Tony! Y U SO IMPATIENT? D: But hey, how are you guys? Sorry that this is so late on getting uploaded...but let's just enjoy the fact that I actually got off my tired ass to write! Sorry it's a little cliffy, but I felt that this was kinda the better place to stop. Hehe. littledhampir13; oh no! Well, I'm not very happy to hear that you broke something in your foot :c That does not sound very much fun at all. Yes, I definitely thought that the story could use a bit of a cutesy break to slowly start creating something of a basis for Steve and Tegan, haha. And it's really only Tony that's so opposed to her, they'll warm up to each other eventually ;) and yes! Thor is here. He just hasn't said or done much, haha. Thank you for the compliment! Sorry these are coming so slow :c (and yes, that's a great quote!) blown-transistor; you changed your name! I was a little startled to see that lol. And yes! He'll have an 'eureka' moment here eventually, x3 Melibells; I'm really seriously growing attached to Steve as a character. The more I write him, the more he grows on me. He has so much potential to be everything. He's certainly the most 'human' character. And by that I mean it's like he's the most connect to his humanity, in a way. I mean Natasha and Clint are humans too, they're just slightly removed and Tony and Bruce have issues. And yes, that's basically what I have gathered from Tony's dislike for Tegan, also aside from the fact that she's as mouthy as he is, lol! You stay awesome too! aubrey1; hah, well would she be Tegan if she did anything differently? Lol. Yes, being attached to Tegan isn't exactly easy. But now that he recognizes this, hopefully he'll make things easier on himself. Psh, but would Steve REALLY know what to do if she jumped his bones? Ahh, such funny thoughts. Astrokinetic; aww, you're too sweet ;u; I hope you stick around for the rest of the story! Anyway, thanks you guys for reviewing, and oh my gosh so many new people have added this story to their alerts and favorites, I can't get over it! It's so awesome! Thank you all! I promise to not make y'all wait so long for the next chapter...maybe.

I do not own any Marvel characters, only the ideas and story are mine.

Story title/chapter titles (c) Five Finger Death Punch (Remember Everything)