Another Lost Soul

1.12

Steve and Tony sat at the conference table in the silent control room. They sat quiet and solemn as Fury stood in front of them.

"These were in Phil Coulson's jacket. Guess he never did get you to sign them." Fury flicked a few bloody Captain American trading cards on the table.

Steve reached over slowly and grabbed them.

"We're dead in the air up here. Our communications, the location of the cube, Banner, Thor. I got nothing for you. I lost my one good eye. Maybe I had that coming." They all took a moment to process that. "Yes, we were going to build an arsenal with the Tesseract. I never put all my chips on that number, though, because I was playing something even riskier."

This caught Tony's attention. He looked up from fiddling with his hands.

"There was an idea, Stark knows this, called the Avengers Initiative. The idea was to bring together a group of remarkable people, to see if they could become something more. To see if they could work together when we needed them to, to fight the battles that we never could." Fury looked pointedly at Tony who was refusing eye contact. "Phil Coulson died still believing in that idea. In heroes.

Tony stood up abruptly before leaving the room.

"Well, it's an old-fashioned notion." Fury finished.

[Scene Change]

Thor walked across the field to find his hammer. He found it, but instead of grabbing it he balled his fist.

[Scene Change]

"You fell out of the sky." A voice called out to Bruce, who was naked in a pile of crushed concrete.

Bruce looked up and around him in confusion. He groaned in frustration and facepalmed. A thought suddenly occurred to him.

His head snapped up. "Did I hurt anybody?"

An older man in a security uniform stood up on top of the rubble. "There's nobody around here to get hurt." he said.

"Except you." Neville said.

The only reason Audrey didn't glare at him is because he said it more like an observation and less of a judgment. She chose to let the comment slide.

"You did scare the hell out of some pigeons, though." The old man added as a forethought.

"Lucky." Bruce informed him.

"Or just good aim. You were awake when you fell." The old man said back.

"You saw?" Bruce asked, slightly embarrassed.

"The whole thing. Right through the ceiling. Big and green and buck-ass nude." The old man said.

This got a few laughs out of the room.

"Here." The man tossed some clothes down to Bruce. "Didn't think those would fit until you shrunk down into a regular-sized feller."

Bruce began putting the pants on. "Thank you."

"Are you an alien?" The man asked skeptically.

"What?" Bruce asked once he got the pants on.

"From outer space, an alien." The man asked again.

"No." Bruce answered.

The older man looked slightly concerned. "Well, then, son, you've got a condition."

Bruce just nodded in agreement.

[Scene Change]

Nikita was leant against the wall in front of Clint's infirmary cot, while Natasha sat in a chair to the right of him. They were watching him aggressively shake his head. He was groaning and breathing heavily, while yanking at his restraints.